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Premature or low birth weight baby?

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This is an extract from the book “Calming Colic” by Christian Bates

Prematurity & low birth weight

In a piece of research looking at the gut bacteria in preterm infants I found this conclusion:
“Measures that may improve microflora could have beneficial effects on digestive tolerance and growth”.

Basically it is saying that improving good bacteria, like I am saying you should do to calm colic, will indeed improve digestion. This highly informative piece of research also discovered that few pre-term babies had the correct type of bacteria in their gut. The researchers go on to say that improving gut bacteria can improve growth in pre-term infants. Every parent that has a pre-term infant should know this! I think I have said that before. Shouldn’t every parent also know about cranial osteopathy and all the other benefits that helping gut microflora can have for their new baby too? I certainly think they should, I hope this ebook helps many of you out.

Here is another quote from a piece of research:
“The gut of extremely low birthweight infants is colonised by a paucity of bacterial species. Breast milking and reduction of antibiotic exposure are critical to increasing fecal microbial diversity.”
Again researchers found that low birthweight babies had less bacteria than they should and they even recommend to breastfeed, so the babies get more good bacteria from their mother, and also to be careful of antibiotic exposure. Now my problem with this recommendation is that a baby wouldn’t be offered antibiotics just willy-nilly one would hope; if they are being prescribed it must be for a good reason, but what we do know is that we can sort things out after they have had antibiotics by using the Culturelle or OptiBac For your child’s health probiotics. So as long as the gut flora is re-established then all should be well after the antibiotics.

What if there is a continued cycle of needing to take antibiotics? In this case I would certainly be trying to break that cycle by finding out the root cause of the recurrent infection and fixing that so the antibiotics aren’t needed. In my clinic I find this more in the toddler age range when it comes to recurrent ear infections rather than in babies and anything related to colic.

I know you are most likely reading this as you have just had a baby but I want to just add some other findings in this section that may be of use to you in the future if you are going to have another baby. I want to share with you that it has been found that if a mother takes a probiotic BEFORE birth it reduces the risk of premature birth (in this study by 18%) and other related complications such as necrotizing enterocolitis (NEC), a devastating bowel complication of pre-term birth. These studies come from mainstream journals, such as the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, just like the other research I have quoted.

It has now been shown that taking a probiotic before delivery of your child, probably for the last month of your pregnancy, has many beneficial effects, so keep this in mind for your next baby and tell your pregnant friends too.

If you would like to have a full cranial osteopathy and nutritional consultation for your baby with Christian Bates he is available at The Perrymount Clinic in Haywards Heath. Please call to book on 01444 410944

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