bottle feeds

[alparen]

how old were your los before the hospital tried the first bottle feed?
Sammy is 34 weeks and shes still on tube feeding. 19ml she gets fed for an hour every 2 hours. They said 35 to 36 weeks till they try a bottle feeding to make sure she starts having a strong sucking action/ want. She is still swinging with desats and bradys since they took her off cpap so they have her on low flow oxygen right now. At first they thought her swinging was due to reflux during feeding but it turns out she just does it whenever.
They won't send her down here to the hospital by my place till that stops and until she is off the feeding machine. They said she has to be able to handle some sort of gravity feeding.

 

[lilangele]

Hi for Maxime they started trying at about 33 weeks(he was born 30 weeks) but they only tried using the nipple of the bottle with a bit in it, they told me at his age its better for them to just sit and grow and such first, I also did get to try breast feeding when Max was able to drink breast milk(he has a milk allergy we found out a little later on) By 34 weeks/35 weeks he was feeding on bottle and then they transferred him to the hospital near us(the hospital near us did not have the means to care for such small baby) once at the hospital near me they just made sure he got to his full feeds and then he was off with us(also needing to be 4 1/2 pounds i think it was)

 

[alparen]

AWw hows you LO doing? what hospital did then end up sending you all to? I thought Monto Fort had a nicu?? Is you lo home yet? Sorry fr the million questions been wondering how you have been!

 

[bob2331]

Hey,

At the hospital where Harry was, they wouldnt even let me try until he was 34 weeks (although the leel 3 where was born let me put him to the breast, which was bigger then his head)
A freind on mine from the unit, her little one was gravity feed to start with then wilthin 2 weeks, was trying bottles xxx

 

[toothfairyx]

I can remember we were trying gravity feeds after a few days, and from around 31 weeks doing non-nutritive sucking with feeds. He was allowed to start sucking feeds at 34 weeks, and his first sucking feed was a breast feed after which he also had bottles and didn't need to be tube fed as he was getting hungry at this point. I think though that they only allowed sucking feeds if they were at 34 weeks and at 3 hourly feeds.
Sounds like the hospitals can be pretty different in their protocols but are they giving Samantha a dummy to suck with her feeds as that will help to establish her sucking?

 

[alparen]

She does have a dummy in her incubator i'm not sure how often they give it to her. i know when she was born they gave it to her straight away. the dummy was as big as her head not kidding and she would get super fussy if it wasn't in her mouth. she loved sucking on it. then they moved her to another hospital in toronto where they also were giving her her dummy. Since being in hamilton i'm not sure how often they give it to her. now that i have that piece of info i am going to give it to her when i go up there on sunday!

 

[alparen]

i posted this lastnight and then got my answer on her bottle feedings today when i had to call and speak to a dr over if she had reflux or not.

 

[lilangele]

AWw hows you LO doing? what hospital did then end up sending you all to? I thought Monto Fort had a nicu?? Is you lo home yet? Sorry fr the million questions been wondering how you have been!

I ended up giving birth at General Hospital due to P-E They then sent him to Gatineau hospital.

Yes he is home he came home on Jan 28th but then went back to hospital on feb 10th due to not pooping(stayed in hospital for another month) but to this day they still do not know why he is ok now but i have to "help" him poop now and then.

Thanks for asking i mostly did not post due to forgetting pw and then not having the time to come on

 

[alparen]

Aww I'm so happy he is hone with you and doing well now! Xoxox

 

[Srrme]

At 34 weeks Elias was allowed one bottle feed per day -- he was getting fed around 40 ml every 3 hours. They eventually increased to two bottle feeds, and so on, until he was taking a bottle every feed. They kept the tube in until he was taking a bottle every feed though -- it was removed a week before discharge.

 

[alparen]

wow 40ml every 3 hours? Samanthas on 21ml every 2 hours and her feed goes in over an hour. I thought she was getting fed alot for her size as they measure her tummy to make sure it's not getting to big with her feeds.

 

[Srrme]

wow 40ml every 3 hours? Samanthas on 21ml every 2 hours and her feed goes in over an hour. I thought she was getting fed alot for her size as they measure her tummy to make sure it's not getting to big with her feeds.

Yep. They would check his stomach every time they increased his feed, to make sure he was digesting all of it (but I don't think they checked the size), and he was. By the time he was discharged, he was eating 60 ml every 3 hours.

 

[Srrme]

Oh! I forgot to ask, is she still on caffeine? They increased Elias' caffeine to the highest dose for a little while, and I think that also helped.

 

[alparen]

Yep she is still on caffeine and they upped it 2 weeks ago when they took her off cpap. they gave her a mega dose the night before the get her brain really going and thenthey shut the cpap off and upped her dosage and she was doing fab. no desat problems hardly and hardly any bradys. Last week she started to desat and brady more so they put her on low flow oxygen. it's turned down as low as it can go.

 

[Srrme]

Yep she is still on caffeine and they upped it 2 weeks ago when they took her off cpap. they gave her a mega dose the night before the get her brain really going and thenthey shut the cpap off and upped her dosage and she was doing fab. no desat problems hardly and hardly any bradys. Last week she started to desat and brady more so they put her on low flow oxygen. it's turned down as low as it can go.

That's good to hear. They split my LO's doses through out the day, giving him half in the morning, and half at night.

 

[Agiboma]

why did they send her to hamilton, i thought kingston would have been closer and better for you if your in ottawa,anyhow Michael was still tube fed up to 38 weeks it was both tube and breast

 

[alparen]

I'm not in Ottawa anymore. I had moved right before xmas to Saint Catharines. Then my water broke here and I got shipped to Sunnybrook in Toronto where I gave birth. Samantha stayed there for a week and got moved to Sick Kids because they tried to take her breathing tube out the day after she was born because she was fighting it and all her tests pointed to her not needing it. when they took it out her lung collapsed and they had a hard time getting it back in so they thought there wa something wrong with her and sent her to sick kids where she stayed for 2 weeks to to see the ENT and to recover from a bleed they caused her in her lung from the tube. After she checked out fine they sent er to hamilton because it was supposed to be closer to us in St CAtharines.. but it's not lol