Dani Hudspeth,

Last year about this time I visited with Dr. Sandra Lang at the U. of
Lancashire, Preston, England.  She is a lecturer in the Dept. of Midwifery
Studies.  If you email me privately I will send her complete address.  She
presented at the 1995 ILCA meeting on her research on cup feeding; her video
on cup feeding preterm infants is very convincing.  I think you would find
her research most helpful in discussions with your neonatologists.

At ILCA She included an extensive bibliography with her presentation.
Advantages listed were: baby paces own intake; less energy required than
when taking fluid (preferably expressed breast milk) from bottle; no
aspiration -if you do not "pour" fluid in - let baby "lap from cup;
stimulates jaw and tongue movements; stimulates olfactory nerve; stimulates
oral saliva -> lipase; better eye - contact between baby and feeder.
Disadvantages: dribble factor (not so much with preemie, more a problem with
term baby; term babies can become addicted to cup - she suggested better to
get term baby to breast as soon as possible.

I don't recall any mention of minute ventilation, tidal volume, oxygen
saturations during her studies - however she had some measure of "energy
expenditure" as I recall.  Her research was published in 1994 _Archives of
Childhood Diseases_ vol. _71_,365-369 and in _Midwives Chronicle_, Vol. 107,
276:171-176, 1994.  She also mentioned an American MD,  Dr. Jim Bossner at
the U. of Maryland, who is doing similar research.

Good luck with your presentation to the Neonatologists.

Martha Pitzer, RN, PhD, IBCLC
Ohio State University
C, olumbus, OH