I use plain ol’ Longs[sup]tm[/sup] brand 3% Hydrogen Peroxide solution to clear my ears when they get plugged (and this happens frequently). The two times I’ve had it “professionally” done (by nurses, both times), they used a H[sub]2[/sub]O[sub]2[/sub] + water solution to flush them. That’s all Murine is really: a weak solution of hydrogen peroxide, water, and glycerine.
I’ve worked in a couple of hospitals, and several doctors would order a stool softener (docusate sodium, one of the brand names is Colace. Oh, the liquid form by the way 
) to put in patient’s ears. A few drops, I think, was all it took. You’d have to put a cotton ball in your ear to keep the stuff there overnight. A lot of the patients swore it worked. I’ve never had to try it myself really. I usually don’t have earwax problems.
SuperLorie
Persephone, glad I could be of help. I refrained from making any earwig jokes, but elelle’s moth story is just as creepy. I seem to remember using the suggested carbamide peroxide once to clear up swimmers ear.
Correction: carbamide peroxide probably wouldn’t do anything for swimmer’s ear.
I’ve been trying the hydrogen peroxide, too, and that’s not working either. Well, it is a little–when I rinse it out, there’s little itty bitty pieces of ear wax that come out, but my ear is still blocked.
Bluepony: I’m just about that frustrated. I surely am. I’ve got friends that I trust, who also own that kind of equipment…:eek:
Kelvin & SuperLorie: I can understand how a stool softener would work. It’s a liquid that softens stuff up, right? Why wouldn’t it work on ear wax? I’ve only had to take a stool softener once, though, and it was in capsule form, prescribed by a doctor. Is it available over the counter? Because I’ll go get some this afternoon if I can.
**Waverly:**You can make all the jokes you like. Jokes at my expense usually end up being pretty darn funny. 
Well, the good news is that earwigs eating your brain is a myth, the bad news is that little critters do get stuck in there. You can read about both the former and the latter here. I doubt John Speke would still recommend the use of a pen knife…
Well…I did try ear candling once many years ago. I immediately got a really virulent and persistent, painful ear infection that took three courses of different antibiotics to cure.
YMMV, but I certainly won’t try that again!
Persephone, IIRC from my pharmacy days, Colace is available over-the-counter. At least in Massachusetts.
–sublight.
If this is the case, whyinhell do they make Q tips the size and shape they do?
Everybody on earth says not to put Q tips in your ear. Hell, it says that on the BOX. So why did I learn from my doctor to use Q-tips to clean my ears out?
I do it three or four times a day. I cannot stand to have even the tiniest amount of dirt or wax in my ears. My doctor NOW advises me to desist. After 30 years. WTF???
BTW, the pediatrician who advised me to clean my ears with q-tips is now serving time on a non-related offense.
b.
I had a serious earwax problem about a year ago.
My ear had stopped up a few times, but an earwax remover kit saved me a trip to the doctor.
Eventually the earwax remover was no match for what was going on in my ear. The remover stuff took me from about 75% hearing loss to 100%. I tried the ear candling and found it to be useless.
Although I wasn’t in pain I had lost all hearing in one ear and it was driving me batty. I broke down and went to the Doctor. If you could see the amount of junk he pulled out of my ear you would understand that no drops, or candles could ever remove all of that. He used suction, and pressure with a water pick type of thing to remove the goo.
At one point he reached in with some tweezers and said he was going to remove the “plug”. Removing it restored my hearing immediately. He told me that I would require a follow up cleaning in two weeks, and that in order to keep my ear open he was going to install a sponge.
WARNING!!! If you wind up having a procedure like the one I’m describing it feels strange and a little uncomfortable but beware of the sponge. If you have one installed request pain killers. After about 4 hours the sponge in my ear had swollen up and was exerting tons of pressure on something in my ear. It was pain deluxe. It took a few hours to get a prescription called in and picked up. I recommend leaving the Doctors office with a prescription and getting it filled on the way home.
If your problem is like mine all you’re doing is storing up more wax every time you get by with a quick fix. A Doctor can get ALL of that crap out. You can even feel the air blowing down your throat.
Good luck.
These people don’t. Fer cryin’out loud, I had to argue with them that a shark was not a cetacean ! And of course, if their theories are not accepted, it is because of the infamous Illuminati/Masonic/AMA/Pharmaceutical cartel conspiracy (I heard at least one of these mentioned at least once, so make your pick).
Oh, and I forgot to mention that in my first post, the length of the course is 30 hrs, most of which is spent on the anatomy of the ear and its pathologies. They learn how to handle candles during practice, nothing written (either on how they work or how they’re made).
I did have to have my doctor clean out my ear one other time, about two years ago. My ears have plugged up since then, but I can usually fix it myself.
I know there is at least one other Doper on this board (I want to say it’s Diane, but don’t quote me) who only has the same problem as me–in fact, I figured it out from a post of hers. Earwax was never a problem until I got off birth control pills. Going back on them was an option I considered, for a second or two. Then I realized that because of my age (I’m 34), it’s probably not an option that my doctor would go along with. Especially considering the fact that earwax control is the only reason I’d be taking them (husband had the big snip already).
I think I’ll look for some stool softener & give that a try.
Billy Rubin: You’re not supposed to stick Q Tips in your ear canal.* The outside part is fine. Just not down the tube. That’s how my problem began, sort of. I was cleaning my ear with a Q Tip, and my daughter was in the bathroom with me, being her usual four-years-old-and-I-must-know-everything-about-what-Mom-is-doing-self. In a freak of timing that would make Rube Goldberg proud, she accidentally bumped my elbow at the precise moment the Q Tip was closest to my ear canal. It went in, and all of a sudden, I couldn’t hear. No pain or swelling, just plugged up. It had to have been pretty packed up in there anyway, though, for it to be giving me this much grief.
Another plugged-ear victim checking in. I’ve never done the earcandling thing and I honestly believe it would never have helped in my case. I’d lost a significant amount of hearing in my right ear a few months ago and had gotten a prescription for Cerumenex - basically a stronger version of Murine. After using that for a couple of days I went to see the doctor and they went in with the water pik and a big long ol’ plastic toothpick (I don’t know what it’s actually called) and blasted the living hell out of my ear. Had to hold the basin under my ear and all that jazz, my shirt got soaked - but after about five minutes something HUGE moved in my ear and I could hear again! Nurse pried it out with the toothpick as it came to the entrance of the canal - the thing was marble-sized. You tell me how a candle is supposed to get that out?!
So anyway, Persephone - have your doctor rinse out your ears when you’re finally able to see him; the Murine should loosen whatever’s in there enough so that repeated (and I mean constantly repeated over the course of ten or fifteen minutes) applications of water will dislodge it and your ears are clear again. If it doesn’t move despite his best efforts get a prescription for Cerumenex and make another appointment for a week later. That should do it.
I understand that,but my doc told me to insert the q-tip in till it nearly touched my eardrum and work it around to remove the wax. He was a real winner, I’m amazed I survived my childhood.
I have never had any earwax problems, but god knows, I may end up deaf someday…
I am always in a bathroom alone with the door locked, sitting on the throne when I do this. I don’t want a q-tip driven into my brain. I have a 5 year old.I also never let the 5 year old see me doing this- she mimics everything else I do, so it’s only logical never to let her see me doing anything I don’t want her to do.
I’m not saying it’s good to do, conventional wisdom says never do it. I’m just saying it’s what I was taught, stupid or not.
b.
I let my kids in the bathroom with me, specifically so then can see what I’m doing. Helps them learn, IMHO. Of course, you’ve got to keep talking, and tell them that it’s NOT okay for them to do it by themselves, and lock up the stuff you don’t want them to touch.
Your doctor told you to do that? Really? You’ve got another doctor now, right? :eek:
Yes, though like most doctors I know this one isn’t worth the powder it’d take to blow him to hell either. This guy tells me to lose weight. How? Eat less, excercise more. Right. Which is why he weighs 300 lbs. Works pretty good.
OBTW,I wasn’t casting aspersions on your parenting!!! I was only commenting on how paranoid I am-hehe! please take no offense…
b.
'Sokay, Billy. If you knew my kids, you would cast aspersions. Little wacko nutjobs, they are. My mom says they’re just like me.
drastic, that is the most amazing site. i believe it must be suggested for weird earls.
Yeah, the mom curse works in my family too. My yearbook photo says “most likely to do hard time” and no doubt, eventually, my daughter will follow suit, I’m just enjoying her now while she’s innocent and sweet.
B.
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- Did any of you guys see the “Buttcandles” site when it was up? - MC
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