In response to Jan's comments: Yes, the Schanler study used PREMIE donor milk. Again, it would have been nice to know the breakdown on the gestational age of milk from moms of premies and the nutrient composition - but this may have been a decision of the journal editorial staff. Often there are space limitations on articles. In response to Dr. Jay Gordan's comments: A full discussion of negative study findings is always very useful. As, illustrated previously, the initial negative findings on vitamin A and morbidity spurred a slew of research that ultimately showed that the wrong definitions (incidence versus prevalence and severity were being used) and confirmed definitively that vitamin A had a huge impact on childhood mortality in deficient populations. That very heated and often emotional (from some otherwise very evidence-based scientists) discussions yielded something of great benefit to the world's children. A remember that providing calories was not enough and that one had to deal with the totality of nutrients. Most xerophthalmia is now a thing of the past and the subclinical varieties of vitamin A deficiency have declined substantially. It triggered much more needed work on other nutrients too. As I recently found out, the Plumpy Nut supplements for the climatic disaster in Niger are no longer the "milk-based" or vitamin C, niacin, vitamin A, other other nutrient-deficient, but primarily calorically adequate supplements of the past. This supplement does contain all of the nutrients needed. When I was in Niger in 1985, not one of the organizations that were mopping up after the famine were the least bit interested in hearing that there was more involved in saving children than just calories. Not only are discussions useful for the particular study in question, but they are useful in general to keep our eyes open when we are reviewing other negative studies. Who knows, but some gem of insight might trigger a response that might then generate the next study that then may provide clues for how to deal with these exceedingly fragile babies. Its not my area either- I work with babies out of the hospital (and can only be reluctantly dragged into hospitals by exceptionally pleading mothers), but I still find this interesting on many levels. Best regards, Susan E. Burger, MHS, PhD, IBCLC *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html