If you thicken your baby's food, your baby is less likely to bring it back up. ^[12] You can get products to thicken milk (brand names Nestargel, Carobel) or use ready-thickened feeds (brand names Enfamil AR, SMA Staydown).

You may be able to get these from your pharmacy or on prescription from your doctor. It's always best to talk to your doctor before changing your baby's feed.

There have been quite a lot of studies on thickening feeds to treat gastro-oesophageal reflux. But some were small, didn't last very long, and weren't of very high-quality. ^[2]

In one larger study with more than 100 children aged 2 weeks to 4 months, babies who had the pre-thickened formula Enfamil AR brought food up on fewer occasions than babies who used a standard formula. Children who had the thickened feed were also less likely to choke or gag. ^[13]

Thickening feeds helps children to keep them down, but they may be more likely to:

• Cough when they have thicker feeds ^[2]

• Get diarrhoea if they have a feed thickened with carob flour ^[2]

• Put on too much weight. Feeds thickened with rice cereal have more calories than unthickened feeds. So your doctor may want you to weigh your child regularly.

If you use a thickened feed, you'll probably need to make the hole in the teat of your child's bottle a little bigger, so that the feed will come out properly.

You can't use food thickeners if you are breastfeeding your baby. Experts recommend that you should give your baby only breast milk for the first six months, if possible. ^[14] So, if you're breastfeeding and your baby is having problems with bringing up food, your doctor may suggest you use another treatment instead, such as sodium alginate.

Glossary

calories

A calorie is a unit that is used to tell how much energy is found in food. But when we talk about how many calories food contains, we actually mean kilocalories, or kcal, which contain 1,000 'small' calories. When your body stores energy instead of using it, you get heavier. This is why you gain weight if you eat foods that are high in calories and the energy is stored instead of used. If your daily calorie intake is the same as the amount of energy your body uses up, your weight will remain the same. If you consume more calories than your body uses, you put on weight. Foods containing fat are high in calories.

diarrhoea

Diarrhoea is when you have loose, watery stools and you need to go to the toilet far more often than usual. Doctors say you have diarrhoea if you need to go to the toilet more than three times a day.

For more terms related to GORD in children

Citations