Effects of Infant Reflux on Activities of Daily Living
Sunday, March 21, 2010 at 2:40PM Eating and Infant Acid Reflux
Having an infant with reflux can be challenging. There are many additional considerations for everyday activities such as eating and sleeping. Some methods of treatment for feeding include positioning the baby as upright as possible and keeping them upright for 30 minutes after feedings. You can also try thickening formula or breast milk, burping frequently, adjusting the size of meals and avoiding spicy, fatty and acidic foods. It can also be helpful to feed smaller amounts, more frequently. In fact, some infants will fall into this pattern early on as a way of coping with reflux.
It is important that infant reflux and other digestive health issues are addressed and monitored by professionals. One complication of untreated infant reflux is failure to thrive. This is diagnosed when babies do not gain weight at an acceptable or safe rate and fall below even the low end of the growth scale. Infant reflux can cause failure to thrive in a few ways. Even if your infant eats well, frequent or constant vomiting of entire feeds will make weight gain, or even maintaining current weight, difficult or impossible. Even if vomiting isn't present, some babies will begin to associate food with pain and may begin to develop aversions to eating which may actually lead to refusal to eat making it difficult to gain weight.
Sleeping and Infant Acid Reflux
Infants start to develop a working memory for routines at 6 months old. This is also the time developmentally that a baby can start to self soothe. I can’t stress enough the importance of establishing good bedtime routines early on for your baby. Routines such as dimming the lights, reading a story, playing soft music and /or rocking your baby to sleep (or a sleepy state). In addition, it is important to have babies sleep in their own cribs starting at 6 months old. This can be in your room or their room. If an infant gets use to sleeping in your bed, a car seat or any other apparatus, it is usually a tough routine to change.
Having said that, this can be difficult if you’re a parent of an infant with reflux. You are parents who are more likely to be sleep-deprived since your infants don’t sleep well therefore will do "anything" for a good night's rest. I know I've been there! Once in their crib, elevating the head of the crib can be helpful in getting a good nights rest for all! For infants with reflux, keeping them upright can reduce the number of reflux episodes. It is recommended to elevate up to 30-degrees (for specific resources see "Should You Elevate the Head of the Crib?" in the Resources Section of this website). This can be done safely with bed risers and the crib’s adjustable settings.
Reader Comments (7)
Great post! We made the mistake of letting our baby sleep in her car seat too often, and she would only settle down if we put her there. We're going to make sure not to do the same thing with the new baby we have on the way!
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Acid reflux is hard to determine in infants and it causes a lack of sleep and also lack of appetite when feeding time. My simplest advice is not to serve cold water or juice before and after sleep.
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