Susan in MN asks 'Is it true that sugar water can overload the pancreas?
How much sugar water?  Will 5 ml 3x a day create a problem for a baby?'

Of course this sparked my curiosity, because I can't picture the situation
in which you would know that a baby was going to get 5 ml of sugar water
three times a day, and I have even more difficulty imagining the situation
in which it would be needed.  I'm guessing from the post that the work
setting is a maternity unit so we are considering newborns, with their
stomach capacity of not much more than those 5 ml, but that's just my guess.

Yes, it could cause a number of problems, though I would not venture to get
as highfalutin' as an endocrinological analysis of effects on the pancreas.
It would suppress a newborn's urge to suckle at the breast, possibly
compromising the start of breastfeeding, which is why we stopped routinely
giving sugar water in the first place. Depending on how concentrated the
solution is, even 5 ml might make baby nauseated, another barrier to
frequent suckling.  Galloping thrush in baby and on mother's nipples can
result from providing yeast fertilizer this way, and that can turn into
premature weaning before you know it.  Caries, if the practice were to
continue during dentition.  A weird reliance on a substance that provides
only calories, free of any redeeming nutritional value and notably not
required for humans, as it is entirely inadequate as a replacement for food
in this species.  And of course all the things Nina B mentioned in her post.

What is the context for this question?

Rachel Myr
Kristiansand, Norway

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