Naomi said,
<<I read somewhere years ago that it was nurses in Sweden (I think it
was Sweden) who discovered this in the 1930s or 40s. Does anyone
know if this is true?>>

I'm not sure if they were in Sweden or just where they were.  I learned about
this when I was in nursing school -- and I did my OB rotation in 1966 which
was really before the universal advent of bililights.  If this IS an enduring
"urban myth" then what precipitated the invention of the bililight?  Basically
what I got from the article Karen cited was that it wasn't that sunlight was
not helpful for jaundiced babies, but that there was no "evidence" (as in a
controlled study) to *prove* it's efficacy, particularly given bililights.

So I wouldn't decry this as myth, or that it doesn't help or isn't effective
-- just that we don't have the studies to prove it.

Another version of the story is that the effect of sunlight on bilirubin was
that when the bilis were drawn on the babies and the lab tech set the basket
containing the vials of blood in the sunny window, when they went to run the
labs, the bilirubins were way lower than was possible given the color of the
babies.

Jan Barger, RN, MA, IBCLC, RLC
Wheaton, Illinois
www.lactationeducationconsultants.com

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