HELP! Need to temporarily use formula due to medication (or do I?) Which one?

[YanknCock]

DS just turned 9 months yesterday, and he's always been breastfed until about 5 minutes ago when he had his first bottle of formula. He started BLW at 6 months and is doing really well with it.

His normal pattern is 1 BF in morning, 4-5oz EBF twice a day at nursery, and 2 BFs in the evening, plus breakfast, lunch, 'tea', and dinner for his solids.

I've been put on the antibiotic ciprofloxacin (yesterday) and had a bit of a panic when I read in the leaflet 'You must not breast-feed your child during treatment with ciprofloxacin, due to the risk of malformation of joint cartilage and other harmful effects in the breast-fed infant'. My GP knew I was still BFing so was fairly annoyed he'd not mentioned this!

But then went back and saw different GP who looked it up in the BNF, that indicated it was 'probably' not enough in breast milk to have an effect. I understand the drug company wants to cover itself so they are always going to err on side of caution. Have checked Breastfeeding Network and it says it is 'unknown' if it is safe.

So have decided to put DS on formula for the week and pump and dump until I'm off this stuff. I had no idea what to get and he was hungry so just grabbed a few cartons of ready mixed SMA follow on milk.

So help please, all you experts, is this the best milk to use for the week? Will I be able to keep up my supply? I'm already taking fenugreek as things were drying up with me being ill. I'm quite sad at suddenly not being able to feed him and I think DS is confused by it. I'd hoped to feed him for at least another 3 months if not longer, and thought next step would be dropping one of the feeds at nursery.

The other complicating factor is work, I need to pump at least twice a day and the sooner I can give up doing that, the better. Would I be better off (after this week) continuing to give him formula for nursery and just BFing when we are together?

Sorry this is so long, thanks in advance for any advice.

you may find that you need to pump above and beyond what he would normally feed, but otoh your supply is v well established at this point

the most i ever had to do was 24 hours so not sure

i wish i could help you more, at any rate this bumps your thread

Hmm.... not sure on the best formula TBH, also, not sure on the side effects of the AB, could you not take a different one??? perhaps ask if there is something you can take while Breastfeeding??? Not sure what you are taking them for, so can't recommend one that is ok to take. (Not sure on most of them anyway, but I know there are Gurus on here who will no doubt be able to answer your queries in a heartbeat)

If there is no alternative, and you feel it safer, then pumping and dumping will keep most if not all of your supply up - just remember to pump frequently - more frequently than he normally takes is what I would suggest to keep your milk up.

Hope you feel better soon.

Info here

Thanks for replies, I'm taking the ciprofloxacin because I've had amoxicillan and co-amoxiclav already and they haven't touched my raging ear infection. Now I have a chest infection on top of it so the GP wanted something stronger.

All this has happened since DS started nursery last month. He has had an ear infection, very bad conjunctivitis (ABs and 2 rounds of drops didn't clear it, needed double strength ointment in the end), and is just finishing erythromyacin for his own chest infection. It has been a miserable month for both of us!

Right, so it sounds like I will be attached to my pump for the next week . I might have to get DH to do the dumping, I will probably cry!

I was looking at UNICEF leaflets about formula types on another thread (not sure where now), and now am questioning if it is follow on milk he should have, or just the regular stuff? It seemed to say follow on milk was just a gimmick and there was no reason to use it, and it had added sugar and lots of other stuff....any ideas?

Follow on is just a gimmick so they can get round not being allowed to advertise breast milk substitutes!

I think all formula brands are more or less the same really - choose the one that's easiest for you to get.

All formulas are pretty much of a muchness.

Follow on is similar to infant formula, either is fine for a 9 month old. Infant formula (ie from birth/stage 1) tends to be slightly easier to digest, but if he's on solids, it shouldn't be a huge problem for him. The follow on also has added iron which can make some babies constipated.

Basically it doesn't make much difference at 9 months, but the infant stuff is probably slightly gentler on his tummy. HTH

xposted, thanks SOH, how do you interpret that information? To me it reads like 'there really isn't enough information to make a solid decision'.

Thanks Bertie and Missus. I only got a few 250ml cartons of the SMA follow on, will see how he does on those. I'm not even sure how much to give him! We just did 4oz and he left a little bit. My mom said I got constipated quite easily as a baby from iron (still do), but no idea how it will affect him--as of yet I don't think constipation has ever been a problem. He's had firmer poos since starting solids, but lots of loose explody ones recently due to his ABs!

I don't know to be frank as I have no medical knowledge. Other than it's usually compatible with bfing and while research shows that small amounts transfer into milk, it's not even near to the amount that a newborn would be given as a direct dose if it needed it.

You weigh up the pros and cons, consider if there's an alternative to the drug and make a decision based on the available research. I've taken several antibiotics while bfing, using lactmed and advice of the bfn to make the decision.

Try looking it up here - Dr Hale is a leading expert on safety of medications and BF.

Thanks Queen, read some more on this from Dr Hale.

I have just got off the phone with Wendy from the Breastfeeding Network!! Lovely lovely woman, I was just going to leave a message on the helpline answerphone, but she picked up.

I told her the whole situation and she was very reassuring. All the stuff about joints is from experiments with rats and nothing has ever been shown in humans, so that was nothing to worry about.

My concern after that was basically if he and I have both been on ABs so much lately, if he gets any more through my breastmilk, will that make it harder for his good gut bacteria to grow back? She said no, that even if the ABs are present, the breastmilk is helping to restore the good bacteria, something that the formula wouldn't do, so advised to keep feeding.

I felt so reassured I starting feeding DS in the middle of the conversation!

Very relieved. DS showed his pleasure by making his happy moaning noises which Wendy could hear and said it was the loveliest sound.

Thanks for all the input everyone, very much appreciated.