My daughter's very pro-breastfeeding pediatrician expressed his concerns
about some recent study reported in JAMA regarding the timing of the
initial cereal exposure in infancy and the risk of  type 1 diabetes
mellitus.

The study he referred to had these statements: "Cereal linked to
diabetes in babies.  Risks increase when guidelines not followed -
"babies with a family history of diabetes who were introduced to cereals
before or after the recommended age of four to six months had a higher
risk of developing a precursor to the disease, researchers said."    Two
teams of researchers , one from U. of Colorado at Denver and the other
from the Diabetes Research Institute in Munich, Germany produced similar
findings in multi-year studies of at risk children that were both
published in the Journal of the AMA.  They found that infants at risk of
diabetes who were fed fiber or rice cereals before they reached the
recommended age of four months were four to five times more likely to
develop an autoimmune response that destroys islet cells in the pancreas
than babies introduced to cereal between four and six months.    The
colorado study also indicated that infants not fed cereal until age
seven months were also at high rish for developing the disease
precursor.    The JAMA vol. 290 No. 13, October 1, 2003 had this:
 "Timing of Initial Cereal Exposure in Infancy and Risk of Islet
Autoimmunity"   Conclusion:  There may be a window of exposure to
cereals in infants outside which initial exposure increases IA risk in
susceptible children.  There were other related articles in JAMA on this
topic - all in 2003, the titles were:  "Early Infant Feeding and Risk of
of Developing Type I Diabetes-Associated Autoantibodies" by Ziegler.
 "Infant Diets and Type 1 Diabetes:  Too Early, Too Late, or Just
Complicated?" by Arkinson and  Gale; and "Infant Feeding" by Torpy,
Lynm, and Glass.

This information was also cited in the BMJ 2004, "Type 1 Diabetes;
recent developments" . and in the Journal Watch Pediatrics and
Adolescent Medicine 2003; 2003:4-4. "Infant Diet and jDiabetes --A
Cereal Killer?"

My daughter asked me if I had heard of this and I had not.  When I
attended the ILCA conference this July I asked a few people if they had
heard of this or of any changes in the recommendations of when to start
solids/cereals etc. - I haven't been able to come up with anything else.
 The pediatrician is willing to learn more but in the meantime he shares
this information with all the mothers who are breastfeeding.

Maybe this has been previously discussed and I just missed it.  The
pediatrician is concerned and is now telling his BF moms to start cereal
before 6 months!


Hoping to learn more . . .
Evelyn Landry, RN, IBCLC, RLC
Lafayette, Louisiana

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