How Can I Help My Constipated Newborn?

It is often difficult to understand what issues a newborn might be facing. Parents strive their best to decipher the coos and cries to understand the needs of their child. But parents can quickly decipher the pain and discomfort that a newborn suffers due to constipation. Seeing your newborn suffering from irregular bowel movements, passing hard tool, and suffering from severe colic as a result, can be extremely worrying.

Ensuring your newborn does not get constipated might be difficult, but it is not impossible. Once you know all about how the gut works and the importance of gut health to ensure your baby’s bowel movements, you will be able to keep this dreaded problem away.

Gut Health with Prebiotics

A healthy gut not only ensures that the food is properly digested, and nutrients absorbed, but it also houses 70%-80% of the body’s immune cells. It is also the space where gut bacteria thrive, which in turn helps ensure routine bowel movements and softer stools. The growth of this essential gut bacteria is fuelled by the presence of prebiotics, which serves as food for the beneficial gut bacteria.

Prebiotics are a type of fibre which are undigestible. As such, they travel the entire length of the gut all the way to the colon, stimulating the production of beneficial gut bacteria.

Role Prebiotics Play in Aiding Digestion

Prebiotics are important to ensure gut flora of good bacteria and other types of microorganisms that colonise the gut. These bacteria aid in digestion and absorption of nutrients and thus smoothen the entire digestive process. This is quintessential for proper bowel movements and to keep constipation away.

Fortunately, prebiotics are abundant in breastmilk which increases the chances of breastfed infants to have healthy gut function and hence, softer stools.

Helping a Constipated Newborn

If your baby is suffering from hard stools and reduce frequency of stools he/she may be suffering from constipation. You can consult your paediatrician if the problem persists. In the meantime, keep feeding breastmilk to your baby which ensure the continuous supply of prebiotics which helps better stool consistency.

Conclusion

Constipation is a common issue in newborns. However, the physical pain it inflicts on the new born should be avoided as much as possible. By giving your baby a healthy and continuous dose of prebiotics, you can ensure good gut health for them, which will go a long way in building a good digestive, as well as, immune system.