FAILURE IN NURSING.

Clutha Leader, Volume XL, Issue 73, 20 March 1914, Page 3

FAILURE IN NURSING.

At the close of last week 's article I referred shortly to a case where the failure in nursing was due solely to the mother being misdirected. I shall now give the particulars of this case in more detail, because I am satisfied that a large number of mothers, who would be peifectlv capable of completely nursing their babies if properly guided, fail to do so owing to supplying the baby, not with too little, but with too much, milk in the first month. Apart from the human mother, there is no instance where the offspring is tempted and urged to suckle beyond its requirements. The most casual observation of what goes on in the fields among our domestic animals shows on all hands the tendency of the mather to prevent too frequent or prolonged suckling. With ourselves, on the contrary, it has been the almost invariable custom to try to induce the baby to nurse nearly twice as ofteu as lie should and to fill himself to repletion, in this connection I have some very liaiye and interesting notes, made bv a | professional nurse, showing perfectly clearly that the baby was suffering from overloading and indigestion at the very time when the nurse was jotting down in her daily record such remarks as: Baby restless and peevish to-day; seems to be going off his food; very sleepy towards the end of each nursing; 1 could not get him to take any more."" ! These notes were made in a case where, under instruction, the baby was being weighed before and after each nursing in order to ascertain how much was being drawn from the breast in the 24 hours. The nurse had not takeu the ! trouble to add up the figures, which would have proved to her that the baby's trouble was due to over-feeding —not, as she supposed, to under-feeding, —that he was actually getting as much as eight ounces beyond his proper allowance, as given on page ,'l4 of theSociety's book, "Feeding and Care of Baby.'' i ILLUSTRATIVE CASE.

I A mother, who had given birth nearly six weeks previously to a strong, j healthy baby weighing over 81b, wrote 'in great distress to say that the'infant had been doing very badly latterlyhad been steadily losing weight and now weighed rather less than at birth. She I had just been ordered to entirely abandon breast-feeding on the ground that, her milk was at fault, and even poisonous. The family were in comfortable ( circumstances, with every advantage as regards the home and assistance in the j way of servants and nurses. The mother | herself was a well-made woman, well de\eloped, and the type of normal I motherhood, not only physically but by , temperament and inclination. She was • domestic, devoted to her children, and, i of all things, anxious to do everything | she could for them. She had failed to nurse her first two children, but felt that ) this ought not to have been the case if , matters had been managed properly. She ; had had the Society's books long before i the last baby was born, and felt sure j that all would be well if she could only get the doctor and nurse to allow her to follow the general course advocated. However, when the time came she found , that they were tied to the usages of the ' \ ictorian era, and would not hear of ■feeding only every three hours, "no night-feeding," etc. I The baby was born plump and healthy, ( and weighed B}lb. At a fortnight she weighed 91b, anil, as the mother said, '"was doing splendidly." The milk | supply was ample, and the baby was suckled with alternate breasts every two hours, there being ]0 feedings in all, in- | eluding the night-feeding. For the next ' week things were not so satisfactory. Baby was fretful and irritable, and suffered from flatulence. She gained only a quarter of a pound in the week, and the mother became worried and slept indifferently. The next week there was a , loss of a quarter of a pound, and marked ■ constipation set in, which the nurse j treated with a daily dose of castor oil, ' without consulting the doctor, who highly disapproved when some weeks j later he discovered what had been done, ! I Iu the fourth week a bottle-feeding was givtju In place of one of tlm breast' ' feedings, aud by the mid of the fifth i week baby was getting four bottle-feed- I mgs. Towards the dose of the sixth , week the weight had gone'down to 81b | 10oz, there was extre'me constipation, j baby was flabby, dull, listless, dissatisfied and irritable, and always cried after I being suckled. Complete stoppage of j breast-feeding had been urged earlier, but was now insisted on, the parents being told that the-violent crying of the child after the breast-feedings and not after the bottle-feedings showed that the mother's milk was poisonous. However, the mother held out, and got a weighing machine, whieh showed that at this stage the baby was getting from

the breast under lOoz in the 24 hours, being rather less than two-fifths of its normal requirement, while the highlydiluted artificial feeding did not supply more than another fifth. The explanation of the satisfaction after the bottlefeedings anil the yelling after sucklings was very obvious, the 4oz or more per feeding given by the bottle filling the stomach and relieving thirst, which the 2oz breast-feeding's failed to do. THE NEW REGIMEN. The cause of failure being not quite clear, the mother was given the following instructions:— (1) Peed only six times in the 24 hours, and give no night-feedingß. (2) Suckle the baby at each feeding time. (3) Immediately before suckling balance the baby, clothes and all, and ;at the end of suckling find I out and, note what weight hta t$

be added to balance again. This shows' how much milk has been drawn off from the breasts. (For details as to weighing before and After sucklipg see pages 57-59 '' Feeding and Care of Baby." (4) Supplement with the necessary quantity of humanised milk, beginning diluted and working up to full strength in the course of a week. The mother had been using only one breast at each feeding, but as the supply was short she was told she must give both breasts each time, as explained on pages 6 and 7 of the Society's book [ ("Feeding and Care of Baby"). The result of this regimen was that the baby started straight away to gain normally, and in the course of the next j month the mother's supply, instead of continuing to dwindle, rose to nearly 17oz a day. The latest news of the baby was that she had gained exactly a pound in the fortnight.