I am writing regarding my 3 year old son’s ear problem. He has been under the GP for his ear problem over the last year and was referred to the children’s hearing assessment clinic (CHAC). On his first referral on 2nd February 2015 they found he had low frequency deafness and asked to see him again 12 weeks later to re-assess him. However, between the 2 appointments he’s had 2 ear infections, a throat infection, severe tonsillitis and thrush which developed due to the amount of antibiotics he has had to take. He’s had 6 courses of antibiotics in 6 months. When we saw the nurse after he was prescribed antibiotics for his tonsillitis, as he had a really sore mouth, she found that he had developed thrush and had to have a course of Nystatin to cure this. His nurse who treated him for that said that she felt he needed to be seen by ENT as he’s been continuously having ear infections and a child of that age shouldn’t have that amount of antibiotics without being seen by a specialist. On his second appointment at CHAC on May 5th 2015 they said his hearing had improved and was normal. At his second CHAC appointment the lady who saw him there said that she couldn’t refer him to ENT as he didn’t have a hearing problem at the time, but we needed to ask his GP for a referral as she agreed that his glue ear needed investigating further due to the amount of ear infections and antibiotics he has had over the last 6 months. We have tried to contact the GP for an appointment for a referral only to be told that he couldn’t see a GP for 2 weeks, and that he needed to see my son to discuss the situation as he wasn’t prepared to refer him without seeing him first. He said that he wouldn’t refer him to ENT at this stage as if he did and there was nothing wrong, then ENT wouldn’t do anything about the problem. I feel this is not acceptable, and that it isn’t right that a 3 year old has to have antibiotics every month to cure ear infections, and I feel that this clearly isn’t working as the ear problem keeps reoccurring. His ear problem is affecting his schooling, he attends nursery at an infant school and since being there in January has had several weeks off with his ear infection. He has to have a week off at a time when he gets an infection as he is so poorly with it, including his speech lacking when he has an infection. Please advise if you can, Many thanks