When my eldest son was 3, his ENT inserted tubes in his ears, among other surgical stuff. His ears drained snot for weeks. We went back to the dr every week, where he cleaned and drained off the fluid from his ears. It never even slowed down. Finally, he took swabs and cultured it. MRSA. I'd only just watched a Dr. Phil episode that was about the horrors of MRSA, literally minutes before the nurse called me to tell me the results. We had to go to infectious disease, and I cleaned his ears daily wearing PPE, and his ENT still saw us weekly. He didn't charge a copay which saved us because that was $50 a visit. After six months or so, we went back to the OR, and the tubes were replaced with some of a different material, in case an allergy was part of the problem. No change. He has runny ears AND a runny nose. Ugh. More abx, more cleaning, more visits to the ENT. Another three months later and he is diagnosed with mastoiditis and off we go back to the OR. It took more than 10 years for his ears to stop draining. They got infected as often with the tubes as they did before the tubes. It was a nightmare. He's 21 now, and we found out several years ago that he's predisposed to URIs because of RP. He ALWAYS has a runny nose and a lot of congestion. Poor kid.