New evidence suggests to calm colic, try Lactobacillus reuteri. Ever see that baby shirt that says, “If I’m not sleeping, nobody’s sleeping?” It’s creator probably had a colicky child. But new parents have a new colic-calming ally: Lactobacillus reuteri.
Italian researchers treated 50 cranky, colicky infants with this probiotic bacterium (108 colony-forming units in 5 drops oil) or placebo for 21 days. At baseline, median crying time was 370 min/day for the L. reuteri group and 300 min/day for controls.
Three weeks later, the probiotic babies were crying a whole lot less—a median of 35 min/day versus 90 min/day in the placebo group. The number of infants with at least 50% reduction in crying time was much higher in the L. reuteri group (Savino F, et al. Pediatrics 2010 Aug 16 early online).
In a previous study, this probiotic out-performed the anti-colic drug, simethicone (Savino F, et al. Pediatrics 2007 Jan;119(1):e124).
2 Comments
Woo Hoo! I am thrilled to hear this – any research on probiotics is something I love 🙂 Our little boy had terrible eczema and food intolerances/allergies since he was baby and the only thing that was able to really help him was his Belly Boost chewables. They have been amazing for him and his skin cleared up and he can also eat more foods that he was once intolerant to. He does still have severe food allergies and we avoid these foods, but overall they have been an answer to our prayers. I am just so happy that more and more studies are showing their health benefits to us all. Thanks for sharing this 🙂
Interesting- why did the placebo group drop so dramatically as well?