I believe in some cases bloody stools in breastfed infants maybe related to vitamin D drops. These drops could be creating allergic reactions in some infants. In fact I read a variety of ingredient lists for vitamin D drops and allergic reactions was something they mention. Blood in stools can be an allergic reaction. These drops also have various dyes and other ingredients that could make an infant respond with blood in the stools. The questions I think we need to ask mothers is whether they are giving vitamin D drops to their infants. If the mother switches to infant formula, I would think it logical that the mother would stop giving the infant vitamin D drops because infant formula already had D in it. Thus the bleeding stops. The vitamin D in the infant formula in all liklihood is a different substance/form than the vitamin in drops. My understanding of the newborn gut is that anything other than human milk will damage it and some studies say this is permanent damage. It is not normal for a breastfed infant to have bleeding in the stools unless their is some sort of allergic reaction to something mom ate (dairy products is a well-known one). Do LCs ask clients about vit D supplementation? Are mom's following through with the AAP recommendations? If they are, then these babies are not being "exclusively" breastfed. And some maybe manifesting allergic reactions. The irony would be that breastfeeding is being blamed for the bleeding when just possibly its the vitamin supplementation. Just something to think about.... Valerie W. McClain *********************************************** 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