Panadol and breastfeeding

[halullat]

I'm in a bit of a panic as I have been breastfeeding my LO whilst taking panadol, I had totally drifted off about the caffeine content and had been taking 6 to 8 tablets a day after my c-section and I'm really very scared that I will have harmed or be harming my baby

 

[ttc bubby no2]

I'm in a bit of a panic as I have been breastfeeding my LO whilst taking panadol, I had totally drifted off about the caffeine content and had been taking 6 to 8 tablets a day after my c-section and I'm really very scared that I will have harmed or be harming my baby

Panadol is fine to have when breastfeeding. I had no idea it even had caffeine in it but google tells me Panadol Extra has 65mg of caffeine.

This is from the NPS Medicine Wise site:
"Caffeine is readily transferred to breast milk and young infants are poor metabolisers of caffeine. Infants who are breastfed by mothers consuming > 300 mg caffeine per day may become jittery and restless, and may experience sleep difficulties. No long-term adverse effects from consuming caffeine in breast milk have been documented."
(https://www.nps.org.au/publications...ust-2010/brief-item-paracetamol-with-caffeine)

So you may have gone over the recommended limit for caffeine but it won't harm your baby. Now that you are aware of it you should probably get some other tablets which are just paracetamol.

Hope that helps

 

[Noo]

Don't worry about what you have already taken - Just switch over to generic brand paracetamol and ibuprofen.

 

[halullat]

Thank you, I manage to get myself into somewhat of a panic quite easily! x

 

[summer rain]

In the UK advice is that it would take the equivalent of 7 strong cups of 'proper' coffee before caffeine is at a detectable level in breastmilk and even then some babies won't be affected by it, others may but as the link above said, it's temporary. I've always been a bit of a caffeine fiend, yet there have been times while I've been BF where I have gone completely caffeine free for about a month and it has made no difference to baby's temprement or sleep. Xx