Greetings All, 

It's wonderful to have the opportunity to work in a setting where hypoglycemia can be quickly resolved when the newborn either directly breastfeeds or is given expressed mother's milk/colostrum.  That said, sometimes neonatal hypoglycemia is not immediately resolved and can even be prolonged to the extent that the infant must be treated in NICU.  The following excerpts are from the ScienceDaily article in January 2017, and the link for the December 2016 study follows.  The article notes that neonatal hypoglycemia has become more common worldwide as a result of the increase in the number of mothers who are overweight, obese or diabetic.

The link to the entire ScienceDaily article: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170131154946.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fhealth_medicine%2Fbreastfeeding+%28Breastfeeding+News+--+ScienceDaily%29

The citation: Munmun Rawat, Praveen Chandrasekharan, Stephen Turkovich, Nancy Barclay, Katherine Perry, Eileen Schroeder, Lisa Testa, Satyan Lakshminrusimha. Oral Dextrose Gel Reduces the Need for Intravenous Dextrose Therapy in Neonatal Hypoglycemia. Biomedicine Hub, 2016; 1 DOI: 10.1159/000448511

The following are excerpts from the ScienceDaily article, which includes a brief interview with the study's lead author:

The UB team published their results last fall in Karger Biomedicine Hub, describing how the use of dextrose gel in asymptomatic babies with low blood sugar helped reduce overall NICU admissions at WCHOB for hypoglycemia from 42 percent to 26 percent. In a majority of babies -- 74 percent -- the sugar gel successfully addressed low blood sugars versus only 58 percent of babies who received regular feedings alone, prior to implementation of the new protocol.

"Dextrose gel is used in adult diabetics all the time," he said, "while in babies, the protocol was to just do feedings. There is sugar in milk, but 100 milliliters of breastmilk or formula has only 7 grams of sugar, while 100 milliliters of gel has 40 grams of sugar."

"We found that when we used the dextrose gel, we could significantly reduce admissions to the newborn intensive care unit, improve the level of breastfeeding at discharge and reduce health care costs," he said. "Previously, if the baby didn't get better after three feeds, they automatically were admitted to the NICU."

When Chandrasekharan presented findings on this research last spring at the Pediatric Academic Societies meeting, the reaction was overwhelming. "There were so many attendees at the session, they had to open up an overflow conference room," he said. Interest in the new protocol continues to spread. The UB researchers have received requests for information from institutions in Texas, Colorado, Georgia, Connecticut and New York State.

The findings are not only improving outcomes for hypoglycemic newborns, they are also leading to new ways to prevent hypoglycemia. Positive results were recently reported by New Zealand researchers studying how to preventively treat newborns at risk for hypoglycemia, such as infants of diabetic mothers, with one dose of oral dextrose. In their commentary accompanying that paper, UB researchers said this is "a novel approach that requires further investigation."

The link to the entire ScienceDaily article: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2017/01/170131154946.htm?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+sciencedaily%2Fhealth_medicine%2Fbreastfeeding+%28Breastfeeding+News+--+ScienceDaily%29

The citation: Munmun Rawat, Praveen Chandrasekharan, Stephen Turkovich, Nancy Barclay, Katherine Perry, Eileen Schroeder, Lisa Testa, Satyan Lakshminrusimha. Oral Dextrose Gel Reduces the Need for Intravenous Dextrose Therapy in Neonatal Hypoglycemia. Biomedicine Hub 2016; 1.  DOI: 10.1159/000448511

With best regards,

Debra Swank, RN BSN IBCLC
Ocala, Florida USA
More Than Reflexes Education
http://www.MoreThanReflexes.org

             ***********************************************

Archives: http://community.lsoft.com/archives/LACTNET.html
To reach list owners: [log in to unmask]
Mail all list management commands to: [log in to unmask]
COMMANDS:
1. To temporarily stop your subscription write in the body of an email: set lactnet nomail
2. To start it again: set lactnet mail
3. To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet
4. To get a comprehensive list of rules and directions: get lactnet welcome