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Date: | Fri, 13 Nov 1998 17:06:32 EST |
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I am interested to see responses to your post. I had a similar situation
recently with a newborn who was not interested in nursing "at all" after birth
- no rooting or sucking. It was a vaginal birth and baby did have what looked
like a sore spot on her head. The night shift nurse did an excellent job
helping mom try breastfeeding, and then when the nursery nurse reported a
chemstrip of 40 they supplemented. This mom had lots of colostrum so they
nippled 15 ccs of mom's colostrum with an orthodontic nipple (baby was slow
with the nipple, too). On the day shift it was thought that since the baby
had a low chemstrip on the night shift, she needed to eat regularly to keep it
up. At this time she either slept or fussed at the breast but didn't suck. A
digital suck assessment on baby revealed no problem with the palate but baby
barely sucked on my gloved finger. The mom again pumped and got 5 - 6 ccs
colostrum which I helped her finger feed to the baby. Baby woke on her own a
few hours later and with help positioning latched on and nursed vigorously for
over 20 minutes!
I agree with you that a baby who doesn't want to suck may be not "normal" but
it could be recovering from the birth and get going again sooner or later. I
also agree that it is a bit of a dilemma what to do with those sleepy babies
under 24 hours, but with a low blood sugar the medical indication is there to
"feed the baby"!
Lori Salisbury, RN, IBCLC
Washington State
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