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Infant feeding

Get advice and support with infant feeding from other users here.

Should I switch to SMA LF?

11 replies

Benjy · 09/09/2008 17:06

DD is 8 weeks and has been exclusively FF for the last 3-4 weeks. She has been having digestive problems: being sick after feeds, days of not pooing ending in explosive diarrhoea and was screaming in pain, kicking legs up to stomach, etc. during and after feeds. She was permanently hungry because she would feeds for a couple of ozs then the pain would begin and she would be unable to continue but would still be hungry and feeds would stop/start like this over a couple of hours. I saw a dr. who was concerned that she might have an intestinal blockage but this now seems unlikely. I bought some colief drops on the off chance they might work and they made a huge difference overnight. She is now feeding normally and is a bit colicky but only what would normally be expected for an 8 week old baby. The dr. thinks it may well be lactose intolerance but because this is often temporary is unsure whether to refer her for testing, etc. because the problem may correct itself. Colief is great but a real faff to prepare: each feed has to be prepared half an hour before it can be eaten and as I have been feeding her on demand this leads to a long delay and lots of crying between the time she gets hungry and 'asks' for food and the time she is fed. I'm wondering whether to switch to SMA LF to bypass this. Is there likely to be any problems if I switch formula and does anyone have any experience of Colief/SMA LF?

OP posts:
tiktok · 09/09/2008 17:16

Benjy, some babies seem to be better if they use a formula without prebiotics in it - worth a try?

I don't know if SMA LF has prebiotics in it or not - you could give their helpline a call.

ClareVoiant · 09/09/2008 17:32

yes, we used colief with good results so switched to sma lf when ds was little, wished we'd discovered it sooner as we had weeks of ds screaming every night for 5-7 hours. as soon as we discovered the colief/sma lf he was a different baby and started to put on weight.

ClareVoiant · 09/09/2008 17:35

btw we kept him on it until he was 12 months, then slowly weaned him onto cows milk and he is fine now.

ClareVoiant · 09/09/2008 17:48

i would say do it. we tried so many different things with ds, omneo comfort worked for a few days but had to be made up hot and cooled, then that we started adding colief to and it was a right pita then a hv told me you could get lactose free formula and we tried sma lf. it was fab, no more screaming. its horrible to watch your lo suffer. I think he was about 12 weeks when we discovered the lf.

fairibell · 09/09/2008 18:01

i would get it on prescription! we get 12 tins at a time on prescription as is very expensive to buy!!

Benjy · 09/09/2008 21:12

Thank you for your advice. Fairibell, do i ask my gp for SMA LF or is the one they prescribe known by a different name?

OP posts:
fairibell · 10/09/2008 07:14

yes just ask for sma lf - explain that the colief worked and want to try that! the other alternative we had was enfamil lacto-free but that one made my daughter consitpated - even though the ingredients are the same! think must just be slightly different amounts!
good luck we had all the same problems and had improvemnt straight away! still not perfect in the constipation but a vast improvement!

Benjy · 14/09/2008 12:26

The GP consulted with another GP in the practice and the decision they made was not to prescribe colief or LF formula. The dr. said she wouldn't want to prescribe either without a firm diagnosis and advised me to take her off the lactase drops and see what happens! Am so pissed off. Yes, that's best practice and I would normally be reluctant to put her on anything without firm proof it was needed but why couldn't they have tested her when I first took her to see them? We've only had a couple of weeks on colief and during that time she has been a different baby: well, happy and comfortable. Dr. then mentioned the cost of prescribing colief and LF, which made me feel that was the real issue in withholding it.

Instinct is to ignore them and continue to buy it over the counter until she is 3-4 months of age when colic would normally resolve itself. If I then take her off and she still has these symptoms I would hope they would take it more seriously at that point and do some immediate investigations. Thanks to you all for your advice.

OP posts:
fairibell · 14/09/2008 23:08

To be honest I would take her back in a couple of weeks and say you have taken her off it and that all the symptoms returned!! OR speak to your health visitor and explain what they have said, ours have been really good, think some of them can also write you prescriptions!
We were told at the hospital there is no reliable test for it, but is a case of eliminating things to see what helped! We were reasonably lucky as mu husband, his mun, sister and my duaghters cousins are all lactose intolerant so knew was likely she might have it!
good luck!

olesuper8 · 15/09/2012 08:00

Just a quick reply in regards to the situation with the GP. I was surprised to read that your doc was so unhelpful, I've been going through a very similar situation with my son and would recommend changing Doctor, there shouldn't be any reason that would stop a GP prescribing Colief or LF formula, and especially not because of the cost.

We had blood tests for our son to rule out infections first, you would need to have another set of tests to rule out Lactose Intolerance. That would give you a definitive answer at least, even though having blood taken from the little one is not very nice.

We are trying Nutramigen with difficulty, perhaps due to the flavour?
A friend swears by SMA LF, which solved the feeding problems with Nutramigen.

tiktok · 15/09/2012 08:21

????

Zombie thread - it's from 2008 :)

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