Is breast milk jaundice harmful? Can I continue to breastfeed if I have breast milk jaundice?

Generally, it appears 4-5 days after birth, gradually worsens, and the elevated bilirubin can last for about 10 days, and then gradually subsides. Many young mothers will ask, can I continue breastfeeding if my baby has breast milk jaundice?

Can I continue breastfeeding if I have breast milk jaundice?

Generally speaking, no, breast milk jaundice has a good prognosis, usually does not have severe symptoms, and does not require special drug treatment. If it is confirmed to be breast milk jaundice by laboratory tests, there is no need to take the baby to the hospital for treatment many times to avoid cross infection.

Breast milk jaundice does not require medication. If the condition is mild, you can continue to breastfeed. If it is severe, you should stop breastfeeding and switch to other formula milk. Breast milk is the most ideal nutrition for babies. In order to ensure that babies get the necessary nutrition, you can adopt the method of multiple small amounts of breastfeeding. During the suspension period, you can use a breast pump to suck out the breast milk to ensure continuous milk secretion. After the baby's jaundice is reduced or subsided, you can continue breastfeeding. After that, even if there is mild jaundice, there is no need to stop breastfeeding.

Generally speaking, jaundice will gradually subside as the baby grows older, and it will not have much impact on the baby's growth and development, so there is no need to worry too much. If the jaundice does not subside after stopping breastfeeding, or even worsens, you should go to the hospital for further examination.

The dangers of breast milk jaundice

(1) Physiological jaundice in newborns Newborns, especially premature babies, will develop jaundice symptoms about two or three days after birth because the functions of the newborn organs have not yet been fully developed. Physiological jaundice has different degrees, some are very mild, and some are very dark yellow, but it will not turn even the eyes yellow.

The yellowness is most severe in about a week after birth. As time goes by, the liver's function gradually comes into play and the yellowness disappears completely in about two weeks.

For breast-fed babies, physiological jaundice sometimes takes one or two months to completely disappear. If the stool or eyes also turn yellow, there is no need to worry if the baby is still energetic. You should check blood regularly to confirm whether it has recovered.

(2) Infants with infectious hepatitis will not develop jaundice due to infection of the liver.

Infants' hepatitis is usually transmitted from their mothers. When a mother has hepatitis, the incubation period of the filterable virus is very long, so the baby may have been infected before the mother becomes ill. Therefore, it is useless to isolate the baby after the mother becomes ill. Some infectious hepatitis is very mild, while others are very serious. Jaundice will appear after hepatitis is confirmed.

(3) Congenital biliary obstruction is caused by the absence of a bile duct or bile duct obstruction, which prevents bile from entering the duodenum and causes jaundice.

Neonatal jaundice usually appears two or three days after the baby is born and disappears between two weeks to one or two months.