Dr. Greene- My 2 year old son had tubes placed in his ear drums at 13 months. As of 2 days ago, they were still present and functioning nearly 12 months after surgery. Immediately following surgery, he had recurrent ear infections with copious amounts of green drainage from nose and both ears for another 3 1/2 months. At that point, the ENT who placed the tubes diagnosed adenoiditis, and put him on Augmentin for 3 weeks in an attempt to avoid an adenoidectomy. Gladly, it worked! He went antibiotic free for 2 months! Since then, nearly 5 months ago, we've had another 8 rounds of antibiotics. Of the 8, 1 was for strep throat and 1 was for bronchitis. The other 6 were for ear infections. We are due to return to the ENT next week for another evaluation. At this point, how might we best (and least invasively) find the root cause of the ear infections? How might we know whether they're viral, acid reflux induced, or truly adenoiditis?