- 78% of health professionals are agreed that the most common cause of colic in young babies is digestive or feeding problems, including swallowing air. A quarter (24%) felt that the mother’s diet could be to blame.
- According to health professionals in the survey, bottle fed babies are the most likely to develop colic (68%) but a quarter (26%) of health professionals interviewed would argue that whether baby is bottle or breast fed, it has no effect on the likelihood of colic occurring.
- A whopping two fifths (40%) of health visitors in this survey believed that it made no difference whether baby was bottle or breast fed to their chances of developing colic.
- 64% of health professionals feel concerned about giving medicines to young babies to ease their colic.
- Over half (53%) of health professionals feel concerned about giving medicines to young babies but would seek medicinal help as a last resort. 7% think that medicine should never be given as a cure to colicky symptoms in young babies.
- Student and trainee midwives and nurses are the least concerned (48%) of all health professions about giving medicine to young babies to ease their colicky symptoms, adopting an ‘if it helps, then it’s worth it’ attitude.
- Midwives are the most concerned when it comes to giving small babies medicine with 11%, compared to the national average of 7%, claiming that small babies should never be given any medicine for colic.
- The most common suggestion from health professionals to mums whose babies still have colic after checking the feeding technique, is to change the teat on the bottle (69%). This is followed by changing the type of bottle (56%).
- Health visitors are the most likely of all the health professions to suggest changing the type of bottle (67%), whilst midwives would prefer to change the teat (83%). A staggering three quarters (73%) of GPs would turn straight to a medicinal solution after ensuring that the feeding technique is correct.
- Of those health professionals who would suggest changing to a specific brand of bottle, 7 out of 10 would suggest Dr Brown’s Natural Flow to their suffering mums and babies.
- An astounding 9 out of 10 (89%) health visitors who would suggest changing to a specific brand of bottle would have no reservation in recommending Dr Brown’s to mums whose babies still have colicky symptoms.
- Dr Brown’s Natural Flow is also the midwives’ favourite with over three quarters (76%) suggesting that mums try changing to this bottle.