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(Reuters Health) – Babies who start taking solid foods at three months sleep better than infants breastfed exclusively up to the age of six months, according to a new analysis of clinical trial data .
The World Health Organization (WHO), the American Academy of Pediatrics and other groups recommend exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months of infancy, after which solid foods can be introduced.
The new data comes from the study Inquiring About Tolerance (EAT), which involved 1,303 infants and aimed to determine whether early introduction of solid foods could help prevent food allergy. The EAT study showed that introducing small amounts of allergenic foods in younger babies helped reduce the risk of food allergies. The American Academy of Pediatrics, the Australian government and others have modified their infant feeding guidelines to reflect the results published in 2016.
Michael Perkin, Population Health Research Institute and St. George's Hospital, both in London, said the results of the new analysis suggest that better sleep could be another benefit of starting the early solids.
As reported in JAMA Pediatrics, Perkin and colleagues compared infant sleep and maternal quality of life among participants in the EAT study. Infants in the early introduction group started taking solids at around 16 weeks, on average, compared to 23 weeks in the standard introduction group.
Five months later, babies who started eating solid foods slept longer than those whose mothers had to breastfeed exclusively for six months. The difference peaked at the age of six months, with the early introduction group having slept an average of nearly 17 minutes longer and persisting after the infant's first birthday. Infants who started solid foods early also woke up about nine percent less often.
The "most clinically important finding," said Dr. Perkin, was that parents of babies who started earlier with solid foods were significantly less likely to report that their child had a sleep problem. serious.
"There was an extremely strong relationship between the quality of life of the mother and infant sleep, which you anticipate," he added. "If the baby sleeps badly, the quality of life of the mother is very clearly affected."
The findings provide solid evidence to support the long-held belief that feeding infants solid foods helps them sleep better, Dr. Jae Kim, a neonatologist from the University of California San Diego and Radey Children & # San Diego Hospital, told Reuters Health in a telephone interview. "It's a study pretty well designed to answer that question," he said.
"As for the recommendations for mothers and their children, I think it's important to try to aim for exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months," she said. -he adds.
When frequent night awakenings of an infant cause worry and anxiety, parents can consult their pediatrician to find out if it is appropriate to start eating solid food, a said Dr. Kim. But the results do not mean that parents should feel free to give solid food to infants under six months to improve their sleep, he added. The early introduction of solids could harm infants who are not ready to chew and swallow, he explained, while solid foods can also lead to early weaning, reducing the benefits of breastfeeding. Breastfeeding.
There is also the question of whether sleeping longer is a good thing for babies – although it can clearly help parents, Kim noted. Babies who sleep more can end up eating less breast milk, he added.
"There is a bit of polarization around this issue," he said. "It's good to have studies like this one to carve real data to help manage this problem."
SOURCE: bit.ly/2N2Buev JAMA Pediatrics, Online July 9, 2018.
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