Nakayla’s Preauricular Sinus Infection

Both Blake and Nakayla has this hole on each side of their ear known as Preauricular Sinus or, in a simpler term, ear pits. All along, I thought it was pretty cute. Don’t ask me why, but I just thought so. We never knew that the ear pit could get infected of sorts, because Blake’s ear pit never gave us any problems. We even thought the doctor was strange for asking us if we wanted to remove it, when Blake was admitted for blunt abdominal trauma with vomiting back in March.

Then, on 5 October 2013, I noticed Nakayla’s ear pit swelling up.

Now, before the swelling, we had noticed that Nakayla’s ear pit seem to always have a drop of pus showing within hours of cleaning it. And because we always kept it clean and dry, I didn’t think it would get infected (Bimbo much, right?). Clearly, I was wrong.

The area were the ear pit was located at swelled and turned just a slight hint of purple. I got really worried, but it was close to midnight when we noticed it. Sean was shocked because he had been cleaning her ears, and he didn’t feel any swelling or redness prior to our discovery. So the very next day, after calling my parents for SOS, they gave me and Nakayla a lift to KKH’s A&E. Oh, how I dread this place so!

We were given a minimum 4-hour waiting period, and because it looked really bad, I decided to wait. Thankfully, Sean and I both decided it was best for Blake to remain home! I prepared myself to have a vending machine kind of dinner. But alas, after waiting for about 2 hours, I got a call from one of the A&E doctors. I skipped ahead of about 100+ queue numbers and got into Room 7.

The A&E doctor explained to me that Nakayla’s case was considered urgent because of her age and reason she was there. I don’t know whether to feel happy or extremely worried that our waiting time got cut short…

Thankfully, after all the checks, the doctor told me that Nakayla’s ear pit infection didn’t spread to the inside of her ears. It was all contained in that one spot. Phew! I was so afraid that it might be worse than it already looks, and the fear that she might lose her hearing because of this infection… I’m just so thankful that it was a minor, contained, infection.

We were sent home with antibiotics that evening, but had to return for a follow-up with an ENT specialist to do a more detailed check-up.

I will continue in another post regarding her follow-up checks with the ENT specialists.