Anti-Colic Bottles: Which Is Best and Does It Really Work?
I am often asked whether the anti-colic bottle can cure or prevent colic in infants.
Small spoiler: ABSOLUTELY NOT!
In fact, gas colic in newborns, like gastroesophageal reflux , is caused by an irritant and inflammatory condition of the intestine that can be PREVENTED (from pregnancy or the first days of life) and/or CURED in the first months of life.
In this article you will find out how it is possible to prevent and cure them and you will find reviews of the most purchased bottles to understand which is the best (no adv).
Every month I treat hundreds of newborns to successfully cure infant colic (read more than 260 verified reviews on Google by typing Matteo Silva Osteopath ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐).
In this article I will explain the real causes of colic in bottle-fed babies and how to treat them.
Before starting, I'll leave you some useful information:
- If you would like to schedule a studio visit with me, you can find me here.
- You can also find me on Instagram with the profile @drsilva.com_official
- In the video courses section you will find how to promote the psychomotor development of the newborn and much more.
What is colic in newborns?
If you've landed on this article, you probably know what infant colic is, right?
Unfortunately, however, you may have been told that they are caused by intestinal immaturity in the baby and that they will pass with time.
I have to tell you that this is not true ! In fact, an intestinal immaturity would not cause all that pain to the little one.
Furthermore, it is not right to abandon the parents of a newborn who suffers from colic and leave them to deal with the tiredness and sense of helplessness in the face of their baby's crying episodes.
Before revealing the real cause of this widespread problem, let's look at the symptoms to recognize the presence of colic in newborns.
The symptoms
The main sign is stomach pain that the newborn manifests with crying, irritability, pulling the legs to the abdomen and contracting the belly.
Additionally, it may happen that during these episodes he repeatedly gasps.
Other symptoms may include:
- the newborn cries often during the day, with loud and often inconsolable cries;
- The newborn is not comforted by the breast or the bottle;
- the baby cries even if he has just eaten enough;
- the newborn is bothered throughout the day, with acute episodes of crying and pain;
- the baby cries until he can pass gas or poop; only then does he calm down;
- The baby cries and wants to latch on to the breast often , trying to calm down (but then starts crying again);
- the baby cries even when breastfed and often detaches from the breast;
- the newborn often detaches himself from the bottle and/or refuses formula milk;
- The child also suffers from gastroesophageal reflux (regurgitation and digestive difficulty);
- the baby feels better when he massages his tummy and blows air;
- the baby sleeps only on the chest and in the arms ;
- the child has difficulty sleeping on his back (he pulls in his tummy and stretches out his legs);
- the newborn's abdomen is tense and swollen , the belly hard and painful;
- there are alterations in intestinal transit : the newborn has difficulty pooping, dyschezia, the newborn does not defecate on his own or defecates less than once a day, constipation, etc.
- the child often pulls and tenses his legs , associating a hard tummy with loud crying.
The real cause of colic
So, if intestinal immaturity is not the cause of colic, what is the real cause?
Infant gas colic is one of the most common and disabling problems for babies in the first few months of life.
Unfortunately, in most cases colic is defined as physiological only because your baby (fortunately) gains weight, despite suffering and crying a lot.
Colic is considered a normal problem that some newborns are destined to have without any specific cause, perhaps caused by a fateful immaturity of the intestine (spoiler: false).
Your baby is not meant to suffer and you parents are not forced to sleepless nights and inconsolable crying.
Colic in newborns is not caused by immaturity of the intestine, but by intestinal inflammation .
Testifying to this without a shadow of a doubt is the recent 2018 scientific study “ Infantile Colic, New Insights into an Old Problem ” which was published in the journal Gastroenterology Clinics of North America .
What was found?
The presence of fecal calprotectin has been observed in breast-fed infants presenting with neonatal colic.
This indicates an inflammatory intestinal condition as the values were the same as those of children who had intestinal inflammation.
This discovery led me to work for 4 consecutive years to investigate the real causes of intestinal inflammation and discover the remedies to prevent and truly cure gas colic in newborns.
How to really solve colic in newborns?
To solve colic it is necessary to know the parameters that determine intestinal inflammation and work on those.
So, the question we need to ask ourselves is this:
What irritates and inflames the intestines of newborns (and also ours)?
The answer is simple: anything that is poorly digested by a child irritates and inflames the child's gastrointestinal system (just as it happens in adults).
Anything that is poorly digested by the baby causes both reflux and gas colic; this is why these problems often coexist.
This does not mean that breast milk or formula are the wrong foods for the baby, but it does mean that certain parameters such as the mother's diet , the type of formula and other essential factors can irritate the baby's intestines and inflame them, causing colic.
Breastfed
If the baby is breastfed, one of the main factors that causes colic is the mother's diet.
What the mother eats passes into the baby's milk (yes, you read that right).
If you've been told you can eat everything, try spending a weekend eating sushi, lasagna, pasta with spicy sauce and pizzoccheri; let me know later. 😉
The foods that the mother eats during pregnancy and while breastfeeding can lead to irritation of your baby's intestines.
This is why in my course ''Treating Gas Colic'' you will find included the video course " Nutrition during Pregnancy and Breastfeeding " created for you by my nutritionist colleague, with 4 weekly menus specifically designed to prevent and treat colic and reflux.