I would appreciate any advice/solutions/tips on how to deal with infants who
are tongue suckers after birth. The ones I say have wallpaper paste on their
palates. I'm currently working with a 38 year old mom 1st pregnancy. 39 wk
gestation infant,spontaneous rupture of membranes, cytotect induced labor,
mityvac delivery, cephlahematoma and lots of hiccoughs in-utero prior to
birth.

Did not breastfeed after delivery, according to the labor nurse the infant
laid on mom's abdomen for the first hour looking totally stunned. I saw the
baby at 24 hours and he either rooted with no latching or fell asleep at the
breast.

Mom and baby had to be discharged yesterday at 48 hours with still no
effective latching. She had started double pumping the afternoon before and
fingerfed the in the colostrum. He sucked the finger well of course. Infant
starting to show signs of jaundice at discharge which I attributed to the
cephlohematoma. Infant also had not stooled since birth. The parents are to
call today if the infant still has not stooled.

My usual tricks are lots of skin to skin, suck training exercises by stroking
the lower lip to get the infant to stick it's tongue out, having the parents
place their finger in the infant's mouth prior to feedings to elicit sucking,
and different holding positions. What else?

Cheryl Stuhldreher