Giving infants probiotics in their first three months in the world could help lower the chances of gastrointestinal disorders.
The leading gastrointestinal disorders that send newborns to the doctor are "infant colic, acid reflux and constipation," an American Medical Association news release reported.
These medical complications can result in negative consequences such as "hospitalization, feeding changes, use of drugs, parental anxiety and loss of parental working days," the news release reported.
The team looked at 554 newborns who were either given the probiotic Lactobacillus reuteri DSM 17938 (L reuteri DSM 17938) or a placebo. For 90 days the team asked the parents to keep a dairy that recorded their newborns' bowel movements, vomiting, inconsolable crying, and pediatric visits.
The team also measured the ".change in daily crying time, vomiting, constipation and the cost benefits of probiotic supplement use," in each individual scenario.
The three-month-olds who were on the probiotic had an average crying time of 38 minutes, compared with 78 minutes in the placebo group. The babies who were taking probiotics had an average of 2.9 cases of vomiting or bowel movements per day while the probiotic subjects experienced an average of 3.6.
Probiotic use was also associated with an average monetary savings of $119 per patient in costs such as hospital bills.
"Driving a change of colonization during the first weeks of life through giving lactobacilli may promote an improvement in intestinal permeability; visceral sensitivity and mast cell density and probiotic administration may represent a new strategy for preventing these conditions, at least in predisposed children," the authors said in the news release.
Colic is often diagnosed in babies who are "crying more than three hours a day, three days a week, for more than three weeks in an otherwise well-fed, healthy baby, " MayoClinic reported. Colic is not believed to have lasting medical consequences.
