Feeding Patterns

Bottle feeding hygiene
There are bacteria everywhere. We breathe, eat and excrete them. Only a few of them are harmful “germs” and our bodies’ defenses deal with most of those provide we don’t take them in huge numbers.
But bacteria are real threat to a bottle-fed baby. He is born without much bodily defense against them and without the help of breast antibodies from milk it takes him quite along time to build it up. In an ordinarily clean home, he’ll cope with the few bacteria he sucks off his own fingers, but his bottles are different.
Milk, especially lukewarm milk, is an ideal breeding ground for bacteria. If a few harmful ones get into his milk or left on a half-washed nipple and the bottle is then left standing around, he may take in an overwhelming number with that feeding.
Gastro-enteritis (or diarrhea and vomiting) is very serious in young babies – thousands have to be admitted to hospitals every year because of it. So keep your baby’s feeding as free of bacteria as you possibly can…
Aim to put sterile milk in to a sterilized bottle and feed it to your baby through a sterilized nipple. Even if a few bacteria get on to that nipple from the air or the baby’s own mouth, they will have no chance to multiply.

Before you make the baby’s
Feeding: sterilize bottles, nipples, nipple covers plus anything that will touch the milk, such as the knife you use for leveling off scoops of powder.
You can sterilize by boiling everything, will-submerged, for ten minutes.
Leave equipment in the sterilizer or unit you need it, but make a fresh solution every 24 hours.
If your remove and use a single bottle, wash it but don’t return it to the sterilizer or the next bottle you use may be one that has been in there for two minutes rather than two hours.

When you make the baby’s formula:
Wash your own hands. Boil the water and let it cool.
Remove bottles from the sterilizer and stand them on a clean surface. Put the correct amount of powder or concentrate into each bottle, remembering not to open concentrate cans with the opener you use for cat food, and to store the rest in the refrigerator.
Add the correct amount of boiled water to each bottle checking the quantity at eye level.
Touch only the edges of nipples and caps. Put nipples on upside down, add caps, screw tight and shake to mix.
Put bottle straight into refrigerator even if they are still warm.

When you feed the baby:
Don’t warm the bottle until the baby is ready for it, then stand it in a jug of hot water.
Reverse the nipple when you are ready to feed, and check milk temperature by dripping some on to your wrist.
Never keep an unfurnished bottle warm – any bacteria will multiply.
Never save unfinished milk for another feeding: it will not be sterile.