to be a little chuffed that tommee tippee can't claim to be anti-colic anymore

[ICBINEG]

I always had a problem with the idea of plastic air valves being "closer to nature"...my suspicions were aroused when two separate inspections of my boobs revealed no such device.

Anyway, hopefully they will now force all their competitors to drop this ridiculous claim also!

ruling

i hope also that some of the vague and unproven health claims on the side of formula cans follow suit.

It's like alot of claims and offers though. They only have to work for a small number of people in order for somewhere or someone to be able to make the claim.

Is it sneaky? Yeah but if your baby hated the bottle you would t stick with it you would try a different one. Just like the best formula isn't the one that makes the most claims its the one which agrees with your baby, that doesn't make them sick or upsets their tummy.

Breast milk is best , everyone knows that but if like me it wasn't possible, does it make the claim
Less valid? No it just means its not what's best for my child. :)

I shouldn't be, but I am, amazed that any posters are defending the promotion of vague/unproven/made-up claims. We are very lucky in this country, like in many other western countries, to have legislation and organisations to make sure companies don't just lie.

I am always pleased to see any un-proven claim removed from a company's product or advertising. Another good day for science and the law.

No closer to nature is not the whole brand slogan, but it is a range within the brand. You can get normal TT bottles an cups etc without the closer to nature tag.

Which I think is fine. It doesn't say it's the same as nature, because obviously it is not, but it may be closer to nature in regards to teat shape or something in comparison to their other bottles....

shrug

ata and pontouf sorry to say the obvious but you do not KNOW that the bottles helped at all.

You know that the symptoms eased at the same time as you switched bottles but you don't know that this had anything to do with the bottles.

One of the reasons that colic is so often associated with bogus claims is that as babies develop it disappears (often over night) without you doing anything to help.

You may well both have simply suffered a coincidence that had nothing to do with the bottles.

The reason they cannot claim a general benefit is because there isn't one.

Painkillers can be demonstrated in double blind trials to help some people (not all but some). TT have no evidence that their bottle helps anyone at all. And neither do you. That's why controlled trials are important....

My LO would feed from any bottle, but is certainly less windy, and dribbles milk far less when he drinks from a TT 'closer to nature' bottle.

alise I am a bit late to reply to OPs post but I do just want to say that yes, I DO know they helped, this little non scientific experiment helped me to decide:

1 - baby with normal bottle = screaming, griping, grumbling, moaning, generally unsettled for ages, wants to sleep, cant etc etc
2 - baby with TT/Dr Browns bottle = absolutely fine
3 - baby tried with a normal bottle again = see 1
4 - baby tried with TT/DR Browns bottle = see 2
5 - every time baby tried with normal bottle = go to 1
6 - every time...you get the picture.......

So, yes, I know they worked because they....er....worked!

ata erm nope sorry...still not seeing any compelling evidence there...

I mean you have heard of the placebo effect right?

I repeat clinical trials are done the way they are for a reason. Asking your mates what appeared to work for them is simply not the same.

What have my mates got to do with it?

I don't understand why you don't want to accept this, but they worked for Ds, I know they did because when I used other types Ds was very distressed during and after a feed. When I used them he was was different baby. Therefore, they worked a bloody treat. That's all the compelling evidence I need thanks :)

I would be happy to accept evidence that the bottles helped with wind (although colic is not really related to wind) but what you are offering ISNT evidence.

Please read the following if you would (and have time - I realise it is long but hopefully worth it):

A test was done in which parents were given a sugary drink to give to their children one day and a non-sugary drink (identical in appearance and taste) to give to their children on another day. They were asked to record what they thought of the children's subsequent behaviour.

On average the parents described that the children had behaved in a hyperactive way more frequently after the sugary drink than the non. More than that - the sessions were video recorded and the children ACTUALLY WERE more hyperactive after the sugary drink than the non.

The only issue with this apparently unsurprising result is that in reality the drinks were identical. Neither of them had sugar in them at all.

The only difference between the drinks was that the parents thought one of them was sugary.

All of the symptoms of hyperactivity were produced simply by the parents expectation that it would occur.

Can you see that we can apply the same logic to the situation with your child and the bottles? If you expected the new bottle to work you may well have over reported (in your head - to yourself) the success of the bottle and over reported failure when you returned to the old bottle. You may also have been sufficiently relaxed and optimistic with the new bottle to create a more relaxed feeding environment for the child. Similarly you may have been tense at having to return to the old bottle and by fearing trouble, have actually created it.

As I said up top, the other explanation is that the bottles do actually make a difference. But the bottle company needs to prove that before claiming it, and no amount of tales such as yours can do that because it is impossible to rule out the bias created by the parent expecting/hoping for a difference.

Does that make sense?

I read that study a while ago and did find it interesting reading.

But no, the same logic cannot be applied to my DS. At all. I did not expect the bottle to work, in fact I found the whole thing to be a bit 'woo' (and bloody expensive woo at that) so was very surprised when it did work, at times I had to use normal ones as I only had 2 of the anti colic ones at one stage and sure enough when reverting back to the normal ones the troubles started again.

Im not talking about a bit of grumpiness here either, Im talking screaming, howling, taking 2 hours to drink 4 oz, DS not being able to get to sleep, walking around with him in my arms, driving about at 2am etc. Im pretty sure I didnt imagine not having to do these things when we used the AC bottles. So, no, the above study, while as I say is very interesting and probably would be relevant in other parts of my life with DS, is most definitely not relevant here.

I have offered you a few facts about my experience, iwhich you dont accept. I dont accept your opinion that they dont work, because of what I have seen and experienced for myself, so we're at a bit of a stalemate .

and have a bit of a jovial, arm punching yet for the 'tales' remark btw.

argh I don't have an opinion on whether they work or not!

I am of the opinion that they need clinical evidence in order to claim that they do. Happily the ASA agree :)

I accept the facts of your experience as what they are. A serious of events seen through your eyes and interpreted (and changed) by your intrinsic bias to find reasons for things as a human being.

It may well be that these bottles help with wind...it may even be that they help with colic although given the majority opinion of the medical community is that wind and colic are all but unrelated I would be very surprised. But there is nothing in your experiences that confirms this, even if I accept everything you have said about them as true.

The fact that your baby was windy and screamy on one bottle and then not on another does not prove that it was the bottle change that caused the behaviour change. Surely you can accept that?

Just because A follows B does not mean that B caused A...no matter how much you would like it too...

I mean my DD's colic cleared up right after I got my hair cut...

I didnt change any events (), or was biased, or interpreted anything. I saw and experienced what I did, as did DP, my mum, my Dad and anyone else that was in a 1 mile radius when DS had one of his 'episodes', which was the fact that when DS was given a normal bottle it was actual hell, and when he had a colic type one he was absolutely fine.

Not quite sure how I, or 3/4 other witnessed could have changed or mis-interpreted what actually happened

How weird your DDs colic cleared up after you got your hair cut! I hope she just had the one episode of colic, if she had been like my DS you'd be bald. Now tell me, do Nurofen work for you? They dont work for me, so if they work for you it must all be in your head.

Of course you changed, interpreted and were biased. You are human! (I hope). I am not talking about deliberate conscious bias but completely unsuspecting unconscious bias! Maybe that is the misunderstanding....

My DD had awful colic for about about 2 months. It stopped all but dead on the day I went to get my haircut. These events may appear related as I had not had my hair cut since birth or throughout the whole time the symptoms happened and they ceased immediately after but I think you will agree it is unlikely. I wonder how many time I would have to repeat that before you would believe that hair cutting influenced colic? If my DD had started up with the wailing later that week and another hair cut had calmed her? Would that be enough? Or 3 times? Or 4? Or would you never believe it?

So one last ditch attempt....

In controlled trials on a variety of colic treatments the placebo effect generates between 30 and 50% reduction in crying. So that means that when you do something that is either nothing, or something that no-one is expecting to make a difference, the symptoms reduce on average between 30 and 50%.

Are you claiming that all the people in those trials were different to you? That they were susceptible or gullible while you, uniquely aren't?

Control treatments included, doing nothing, pretending to give cranial osteopathy but not actually doing anything, adding a ml of water to a bottle feed, giving a ml of water by syringe into mouth etc. etc. and all showed a huge reduction in crying.

So can you acknowledge that the reduction in crying you saw may have been the same as that seen by the parents in these trials who were actually not receiving any meaningful treatment? That therefore it is not possible for you to tell if the bottle was helpful or simply that any perceived difference is likely to reduce symptoms even if no actual change is made?

Or maybe you really are the first of a new breed of superhuman completely devoid of unconscious bias....you are not vulnerable to the placebo effect and unlike ever other human alive, only ever see causal relationships where they actually exist!

If so can I make a plea that you devote yourself to the performing of medical trials? Currently they are very expensive and time consuming because you have to test so many (hundreds) normal humans in order to eliminate all the possible biases and placebo effects....but we could just use the one of you and get it right every time!

i saw a brilliant poster from a breastfeeding site, on one side was the "closer to natures/breastmilk" claim and the other side was a woman up a step ladder with the claim "closer to themoon" made me lol

I would never believe that you cutting your hair had anything to do with the colic, obviously, unless your hair grows down your baby's gullet? Or your baby is actually attached to your head?

No I do not acknowledge that the reduction in crying I saw was the placebo effect, because it wasnt one, or two, or 3 instances, or even 15. It was far more than that. So apologies for the confusion and if I made it seem like it was just one or two instances that could be attributed to a coincidence, because it wasn't.

So no, Im not superhuman (although we're not actually talking about me, I wasnt the one with the colic), Im just someone, like many others, who have seen proof that they can work for some children (note I have never said they work for all, just like painkillers etc dont work for all despite ropey claims from the manufacturers). Im finding it a bit weird that you are almost suggesting that the placebo effect works with everyone btw (your comment about me being Superhuman and unique etc kind of leans that way ).

I am not arguing that the placebo effect doesnt exist, Im just arguing that it most definitely was not that in the case of my DS. The bottles helped, a lot, thats all there is to it really.

Hope that clears it up

mama that's a good one!

Ata well I guess there is nothing to say really....you seem convinced that while everyone in all the trials I describe would also have put the changes incorrectly down to the intervention that hadn't actually happened, there is no chance that you could have experienced the same. There is no point arguing with magical thinking as I have learned from my DH and his OCD.

The placebo effect and other forms of unconscious bias are general. Humans are more or less susceptible but we all have the mental processes that lead to assumptions of causality where none exists - it's genetically coded in.

Oh except for you of course. Anything you see as a "working for me" actually does work.....

Oh I can't stand magical thinking either, much prefer to trust what I see for myself. And as you have, again, resorted to patronising and trying to convince me that its all in my head ill respond in the same way I do my dad......"yes, dad, you are corect"

I never bought tommee tippee bottles for the anti colic claim. I bought them because I wanted to combine feed, and both my babies bottle and breast fed happily and could switch between the two many times a day. The shape of the teat is large so they both "latched" on to the bottle, which means they never forgot the latching technique.

They are definitely more 'nipple' shaped than normal bottles, Ds2 took to them easily when he had the odd ebm bottle. No probs with colic with Ds2 either, id kind of assumed we would because of how Ds1 was when he didn't have the TT bottles but thankfully not. Just issues with him never bloody sleeping!

yup ata I think this is why there is no point discussion science with the public.

scientist = believe the evidence even if it contradicts their personal experience because they accept that there personal experience may be flawed/caused by coincidence.

Public = it worked for me so it must be true regardless of any evidence to the contrary.

Anyway if you want to go on paying money for things that may or may not actually make a difference rather than finding out which actually do make a difference then go to it. Luckily you have several government agencies watching your back to make sure that you are not sold totally up the garden path....

fakebook well you will continue to able to buy them for whatever reason you like but they will not come in packages that say "anti-colic" until they have provided evidence that they actually are.

TBH the scientists I have spoken to during my previous career have been much less arrogant, patronising and "I am right, you are wrong, that simply didnt happen because a study I read said so and I am a Scientist dont you know" so I have generally had pretty good informative discussions with them

I honestly dont know what the frankly bizarre issue you have with this is, and yes I realise I am just as stubborn for responding, but it was no coincidence. I hate to drone on but I will but if it had been one or two instances Id agree, massive coincidence. But in the case of my DS it wasn't a coincidence. Every single time a normal bottles was used by anyone = meltdown, a AC one - fine. Not just seen by myself, but by DP (who had no idea that the bottles were AC) and mine and DPs parents . I dont need to be a scientist to work out that if wind can sometimes be caused by too much air being gulped in during a feed, or the teat collapsing causing baby to fuss/gulp in air etc and wind can sometimes be one of the factors in the symptoms of colic, and the addition of a valve can lead to eliminating this issue as you admit above, then its screaming common sense that it can (CAN, not WILL, CAN) help with the symptoms of colic in some babies. I mean, you did know all that.....right?

I realise that just because the bottles worked for DS doesnt mean they work for everyone (just like placebos dont work for everyone eh?), which is why if I am asked if I ever used them by friends etc I give them my experience of them, but always say to them if they are tempted to just buy one bottle first as it may not work for their baby.

Or, to put it another way "yes, Dad, you are correct, as always"

i have to say im very confused - i just took a little look on the nhs website and it says techniques to help with colic - sit baby up when feeding the help prevent wind. im pretty sure the bottle are designed to help prevent the baby from swallowing to much air, hence preventing wind? you might say that colic has nothing to do with wind but the nhs begs to differ....

also colic is also associated with babies not having enough of the enzyme lactase. colief is available to help with this (it was a life saver for us actually) are you saying the same about that?