Jonathan Ck Wells, Rakhshanda Bilal, Khawaja Ahmad Abbass, Zahid Latif, Samina Roohi, Assad Hafeez.
Breast-milk intake in exclusively breastfed Pakistani infants: an estimation by deuterium dilution method.
Pak Paed J Jan ;31(3):111-9.

Objective: To establish the breast milk output in Pakistani mothers using deuterium dilution method Subjects and methods: This was a cross sectional descriptive study in which 27 mother-infant pairs were recruited and estimation of breast milk outputs was made, after an informed consent, by using standard deuterium dilution method at 1 month and 3 months post partum. The comparison of results was made with other reported breast milk outputs from reference populations. Changes in mothers Fat Free Mass (FFM) and Fat Mass (FM) between 1 and 3 months post-partum were also calculated. Results: The mothers were of normal weight (mean BMI of 22 kg/m2), and mean weight of infants at 1 month was 3.86 kgs and at 3 months it was 5.18 kgs. Milk intake by deuterium averaged 703 ml/day at 1 month and 900 ml/day at 3 months of age. Between 1 and 3 months, maternal weight showed a minor decline. There was no significant correlation between change in weight, or change in fat mass, and production of breast milk at 1 or 3 months. Conclusions: The breast-milk transfer in our sample was either similar to that reported in other developing country populations (1 month) or higher (3 months). Population-differences in the relationship between infant body water and anthropometry may have accounted for this measurement difference in the present study and we recommend further investigation into this area.

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