Dear Friends: I wish we had some published evidence that finger feeding is effective, and that it does what some practitioners say it does. I know there are a lot of stories about it, but case histories are low in the hierarchy of research. I'd love a randomly assigned, prospective clinical study! I remember Kittie Frantz asking what was the difference between a gloved finger and a bottle teat. When I read Mizuno and Ueda's study 'Development of sucking behavior in infants with Down's Syndrome' (Acta Paediatr 2001; 90:1384-1388), I wondered if the deficiency in the smooth tongue movements could be reduced by finger feeding as a step to help a baby with Down's Syndrome breastfeed. warmly, Nikki Lee RN, MS, Mother of 2, IBCLC, CCE Maternal-Child Adjunct Faculty Union Institute and University Film Reviews Editor, Journal of Human Lactation Support the WHO Code and the Mother-Friendly Childbirth Initiative *********************************************** 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