Emma Forward: Hello, I’m Emma Forward and I am joined by Dr. Su Laurent, who is a consultant pediatrician at Barnet Hospital in Hertfordshire. Hello Su.
Dr. Su Laurent: Hi Emma.
Emma Forward: I got a question here from a young mom who says my baby often seems to be in pain after feeding, how do I tell that this is colic and what should I do it about it. So many people want to hear the answer today.
Dr. Su Laurent: This is a very, very common problem and I think there are very few babies actually you get a bit of pain at some point as often put down to colic to begin with little bit later maybe its teething pain and everybody wants to have an explanation. And I think first of all you need to think about how severe is this pain and sort of a baby who has real colic, sort of baby who is drawing out their legs and you can tell from their cry, quite quickly this is the painful cry, its not a hungry cry or a demanding cry, it’s a I am in pain and they really do look upset. And that might be a sort of a baby who has colic, but it may also be the sort of baby who has what we call reflux, that’s what I wanted to particularly bring out today, because reflux is quite common.
What happens here is that babies when they swallow most of the milk should remain in the tummy but many babies have what’s called reflux which means that milk will back up inside their esophagus so they got and cause pain because that the tummy, acid, so that burns inside and some babies really seem to be in pain immediately after eating and if that’s happening, you do need to go and see your doctor because there are medicines which can help not only medicines that again thicken the milk and help keep it down and but also medicine that would prevent the acid from coming back out or prevent the vomiting if your baby is also vomiting.
Emma Forward: So, if you get the right medicine that something will be tackled quite quickly.
Dr. Su Laurent: Quite quickly, so it’s important to go if your baby seems to be in pain after feed. It’s important to go and see your doctor and talk it through.
Emma Forward: Do you think sometimes the new moms they are looking at their little ones and just saying that sort of discomfortable wind because we are comfortable, and then thinking is that more serious and it is.
Dr. Su Laurent: Exactly and actually this is also way your help is comes in because deciding between the two is often very difficult if you are a brand new mom and babies will sort of -- little blue around the mom and so.
Emma Forward: Pulling up their faces.
Dr. Su Laurent: To see up their faces and then they will settle and they will be comfortable and I think it’s often helpful if you don’t have a clue, either ask an experienced mom, you know your friend, your own mom, somebody that you can say is this normal or not or you have a visitor these are the people that are really going to be helpful to begin with.
Emma Forward: And you are really happy to answer these questions.
Dr. Su Laurent: Yes, yes exactly yes.
Emma Forward: Good advice as always Su. Thank you very much and if you have a similar problem we hope we might have given you some help, but remember it’s always best to go and see your own doctor for medical advice. Thanks for watching, we will be back with more health questions and answers.
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