All children's doctors actively promote breastfeeding, as with mother's milk, the baby receives not only nutrients, but also antibodies, which are its first defense against all kinds of microbes, hundreds of thousands living in the environment. However, mother's milk cannot save from all troubles. This is confirmed by such an unpleasant phenomenon as loose stools in a breastfed baby.
If your baby has it, do not immediately panic, because the cause of the problem can be quite harmless, not dangerous. We offer to figure out when loose stools in infants are a sign of a disease, and when they are a normal physiological process.
Features of defecation in children under one year old
I would like to warn young mothers that loose stools in babies are not always a disease. Immediately after birth, he does not have fecal masses in his intestines as such, because he has never eaten like a human being. Therefore, in the first day and a half in the diaper, you should see meconium. It looks like a tar-like paste, and its color is frombrown to green in various combinations. This is the norm! You need to worry if the first "stool" in the baby will be different, which may be a sign of problems with his intestines.
Approximately on the second or third day, the “kaki” crumbs become grayish-green, and semi-liquid in consistency. This is also normal, meaning that the baby is getting enough colostrum.
Liquid stool in a baby for a month is considered good if it is in consistency like thick pea soup or semi-liquid semolina. Its color can be yellow-brown in various variations (more yellow, more brown). White blotches in the feces are also the norm, indicating that the baby has not yet had a well-established digestion process. Even a greenish tint of stool, if the baby feels great, is not an indicator of illness. The number of trips "in the diaper" at this stage can be up to 12 times. It's not diarrhea.
After about 2 months, the number of bowel movements in an infant decreases. The norm is already their number up to 4 times a day, and in some children 1 time in 3-4 days.
By six months, the child's stool becomes more formed, and the number of bowel movements is reduced to 2-3 times a day.
After 3 months, the baby is already going to the potty like an adult.
If the baby is only breastfed, his stool should smell like sour milk.
If your baby has defecation deviations from the above norms, the first and most important thing to do is to call a doctor.
Let's considerwhy problems with feces can occur.
When there is loose stools, but there is no illness?
Breastfeeding is definitely a blessing. It consists not only in the fact that the baby receives mother's antibodies, but also in the fact that there is no need to worry about the sterility of the bottles, to spend money on far from cheap baby food. However, for a mother, breastfeeding is a big test, because she must constantly monitor her diet, denying herself many tasty and he althy foods, and at the same time maintain her immunity level.
If she is suddenly tempted by a ripe strawberry or a fragrant apricot, you can immediately expect problems with the contents of the baby's diaper. Even green loose stools may appear in the baby, because this is how his still very weak intestine will react to an unfamiliar product.
So mom will have to carefully select dishes for her diet and watch which foods do not suit her baby. As a rule, loose stools in a breastfed baby caused by the food of his wet nurse improve without treatment as soon as the mother stops eating dangerous foods. These include all citrus fruits, plums, apricots, grapes, strawberries, tomatoes, cucumbers, pickles and marinades, coffee, cabbage, legumes, garlic, onions.
Breast Attachment
Another harmless cause of loose stools in a baby is the mother's inability to properly breastfeed her child. Some parents are afraid that their beloved children will remain hungry. So every time you feedthey put one nipple in his mouth, then the other. As a result, the child eats only the “first milk”, and does not have time to get to he althy fats located a little deeper in the chest. This also leads to diarrhea. The stools may be greenish, frothy, but without blood or mucus. An indicator that this is not a disease is the condition of the child. As a rule, with the establishment of a diet, his stool returns to normal.
Complementary food
Even if the baby is only breastfed, there comes a time when he needs to start giving adult food. It's called food. As a rule, they give him applesauce first. Then gradually introduce other fruits, vegetables, dairy products, meat into the diet. Not all children's intestines immediately accept them, responding to innovations with loose stools. In a breastfed baby, diarrhea quickly stops without therapeutic measures if the mother cancels complementary foods and continues to give only her own milk. In some cases, doctors recommend giving your baby probiotics to drink.
When chair becomes a problem
Above, we looked at situations in which infants' bowel movements can be liquid, with a green tint and even foam, but this is not a disease. However, not everything is always so wonderful. Small children, although they do not yet play in the sandbox, do not go to kindergarten and do not pick up non-sterile objects, also suffer from quite serious ailments, one of the symptoms of which is loose stools. Babies can happen:
- Dysbacteriosis.
- Rotavirus.
- Dysentery.
- Salmonellosis.
- Enterovirus.
These are the most common diseases. With the exception of dysbacteriosis, they are all the result of non-compliance by the mother or staff caring for the baby with hygiene rules. They are as follows:
- Dummy, nipples and bottles (for example, for water) the child needs to boil, as almost all microbes die.
- Rattles and other items that a child picks up should be washed thoroughly.
- All baby utensils must be kept out of the reach of flies and cockroaches.
- Babies should not have contact with older brothers and sisters if their children's groups are quarantined, or if they themselves have he alth problems (runny nose, cough, diarrhea).
- Relatives of the baby, and especially the mother, after returning home from work, from the store, and so on, must first change clothes, wash their hands, and only then approach the baby, take him in his arms. You can pick up germs anywhere - in transport, at the workplace, in your own entrance. They will not harm adults, as they have already developed immunity. But for a baby who just came into our world, it doesn’t take much to get sick.
- If adult family members feel the slightest discomfort, they should stop all contact with the baby. The exception is a nursing mother, who is obliged to take care of the child by thoroughly washing her hands and wearing a medical mask.
These rules are very simple, but they preventinfection of the baby with many pathogenic bacteria and viruses that live in the external environment.
Let's consider what kind of stool happens with the above ailments.
Dysbacteriosis
All babies come into our world sterile. Microbes are introduced into their small body already at the time of birth and continue to colonize the intestines for another three months. Only by this time, digestion is normalized in infants. The intestinal microflora includes "good" microbes and "bad" microbes. The former are involved in the digestion of food and keep the number of the latter under control, which are just waiting for this control to weaken in order to begin to multiply in huge numbers.
If this happens, there is an imbalance in the microflora. This is what causes dysbiosis. His indicator in infants is loose stools with mucus. In this case, the stools are often frothy, greenish in color. Their number increases up to 20 times, and sometimes even more.
Reason for imbalance:
- Mom's inappropriate food for baby.
- Poor hygiene (adults do not sterilize baby bottles and nipples, do not wash toys, do not wash their hands before starting to work with a baby).
- Illnesses of a child or mother, in which antibiotics had to be taken.
- Mom has problems during pregnancy that forced her to take medication.
- Long hospital stay.
- Difficult birth.
- Bad environment.
If a child is suspected of having dysbacteriosis, stool culture is performed. He will show exactly what is happening in his intestines, but he is preparingfor a long time. Therefore, an express respiratory test is performed, which in a matter of hours will show whether there is a dysbacteriosis or not.
Treatment of infants is complex. It includes taking the drug "Bacteriophage", enzymes, sorbents, antibiotics, probiotics, prebiotics.
Rotavirus
These microorganisms infect more than a million babies every year. The source of the disease is only man. The route of transmission of the infection is fecal-oral, that is, this virus can get to the baby if the people caring for it do not observe hygiene, do not wash their hands and toys, do not boil bottles and nipples. However, up to six months, the baby does not get sick, as his mother's immunity protects him from rotavirus.
One of the symptoms of the disease is liquid yellow stools in infants. It happens like this for the first 2-3 days, and then it becomes similar in consistency to gray-yellow clay. The child walks "in a big way" up to 25 times a day.
Other symptoms:
- Temperature.
- Vomiting.
- No food.
- Rhinitis.
- Cough.
- Red throat.
- Sour eyes.
- Plaque on the tongue.
- Enlarged lymph nodes.
Treatment for babies is carried out in a hospital. Basically, it consists in preventing dehydration, for which the child is given droppers. He is also given Regidron, sorbents, antiviral agents.
Dysentery (shigellosis)
This disease in infants is extremely rare. It is caused by Shigella bacteria that parasitize in the intestines. Risk groups: prematurechildren who are weak, poorly gaining weight, have recently had any infection, suffering from diathesis, rickets, anemia.
Infection caused by poor hygiene.
Dysentery symptoms:
Green loose stools in a baby. Mucus can be observed in it, and after a while, streaks of blood. The child "goes to the potty" up to 30 times.
Other symptoms:
- Tummy pain causing baby to cry a lot.
- Increased gas formation.
- Bloating.
- Temperature.
- Fever.
- Dehydration.
Treatment of dysentery in infants is carried out exclusively in the hospital.
Therapy includes taking enterosorbents, Regidron, antibiotics, antipyretics (if the temperature is high), probiotics and prebiotics.
Salmonellosis
This disease is caused by the rod-shaped bacteria Salmonella. You can catch them even in the maternity hospital. Salmonella is the most "harmful" there. They have been fighting with people for a place in the sun for so long that they have perfectly learned how to bypass all the traps, recognize antibiotics and avoid destruction. It is extremely difficult to treat "hospital" salmonellosis. Causes of infection:
- Poor hygiene. Salmonella die already at a temperature of +55 degrees. Therefore, do not be lazy to boil children's dishes.
- Infection of the fetus during pregnancy.
- Airborne way. It rarely works, but it cannot be ruled out.
- Infection through unboiled water. It is not necessary to drink it to the baby. You can pick up a microbe andbathing in a tub.
Symptoms of salmonellosis can be as follows:
- Loose stools in babies, frothy, watery, with a pungent odor.
- Heat temperature.
- Frequent regurgitation. Bad-smelling vomit.
- Colic.
- Anxiety, sleep disturbance.
- Fannel recession.
- Severe bloating.
Diagnosis and treatment are carried out exclusively in the hospital.
Enteroviruses
This type of parasite includes several dozen microorganisms that penetrate the intestines through the mouth and develop violent pathological activity there. Among them are the following groups of viruses:
- Coxsackie.
- Polio.
- Enterovirus.
- Echovirus.
They all thrive in a standard apartment where they can live on surfaces for several days. Enteroviruses in the body of an infected person are found in both feces and saliva. Therefore, they can be infected both by airborne droplets and fecal-oral routes.
This parasite gets to the baby during games with contaminated toys, when touching surfaces where there are microorganisms, in close contact with relatives who are carriers of enteroviruses. A baby has passive immunity to many of them, which comes with mother's breast milk, and children are vaccinated against polio. Therefore, infection with an enterovirus infection of a child under six months is unlikely. In the future, this may very well be the case. Symptoms:
- Hightemperature.
- Fever.
- Rhinitis.
- Red sore throat.
- Cough.
- Baby moodiness, crying because of pain in the tummy.
- Loose stools in babies. Usually the color of the bowel movements is the same as without diarrhea.
Treatment of infants, if the disease is mild, can be done at home. In the room where the baby is located, you need to create a suitable microclimate for him - fresh air, the humidity of which is not lower than 50% and not higher than 70%, the temperature in the room is from 18 to 20 degrees.
Sorbents are recommended for preparations, with severe diarrhea "Regidron" and plenty of fluids.
Dehydration
Regardless of the reasons for loose stools in infants, dehydration occurs with repeated bowel movements. Its symptoms are:
- The baby is crying, but there are no tears.
- Sunken eyes.
- Loose skin.
- Reduced number of urination (calculated by wet diapers).
- Dry mucous membranes.
- Pointed nose.
- Weakness, indifference to everything.
- Low pressure.
- Tachycardia.
If the baby has such symptoms with loose stools, you should immediately call an ambulance. While she is driving, the child should be given plenty of water.
This is a very important element in the treatment of diarrhea in absolutely all cases, even when the baby's condition is satisfactory.
If a baby has problems with stool, it is necessary to call a pediatrician at home. If he offershospitalization, you need to agree, since only in a hospital can they find out the reliable cause of diarrhea and cure the baby without waiting for complications.
