Kobayashi, 25, just gave birth to a healthy baby boy a few months ago, and the arrival of a new life makes both parents very happy.
Since Kobayashi was a first-time mother, she had no experience in parenting, and her husband knew nothing about it. So Xiaolin's mother-in-law rushed from her hometown to the side of the little couple to take care of the baby full-time.
At first, life was quite harmonious, but a month after the baby was born, Kobayashi found that the mother-in-law had begun to feed the baby complementary food, she hurried to the Internet to check the relevant content, generally recommended not to feed the child complementary food prematurely.
Kobayashi euphemistically expressed this matter to her mother-in-law, but the mother-in-law did not think so, saying: "How can the nutrition of only relying on milk be enough, the previous children were fed like this, there is no problem at all." Although Kobayashi still had some concerns, he had no choice.
A few months passed like this, and one day Kobayashi suddenly found that the baby's urine actually contained blood, which frightened the family and rushed to the hospital with the baby.
After some examination, the baby was diagnosed with kidney stones.
"Kidney stones?" Kobayashi was shocked: "The baby is only 5 months old, how can he get this disease?" ”
The doctor inquired about some of the usual situations, and when he heard that the child had begun to eat complementary foods less than a month after birth, he reprimanded: "It is simply nonsense, how can a child still be so young to eat complementary foods." The reason why the baby will get kidney stones should be the scourge of complementary food. ”
Feeding your baby complementary foods can cause kidney stones? Before we understand this problem, let's first understand what is a kidney stone in children?
1. What are kidney stones in children?
Kidney stones are a common disease in the urinary system, which is a crystallization formed by excessive aggregation of crystalline material in the urine under the influence of certain factors. In the long run, a large number of crystals gather in the kidneys, forming kidney stones.
Kidney stones are more common in adults and are rare in children, but this should not lead to a letting down of vigilance. Children with kidney stones often have a series of symptoms, if not treated in time, it may cause more serious consequences.
What are the symptoms of kidney stones in children?
The most common symptom of kidney stones in children is hematuria. When symptoms are mild, the color of the child's urine is the same as normal, and it can only be detected under a microscope that it contains red blood cells. If the child's condition is more severe, his urine will turn red visible to the naked eye.
The reason why kidney stones cause hematuria is mainly because the stones rub in the kidneys, causing local kidney tissue to be congested or even ruptured, resulting in blood entering the urine and causing hematuria.
Kidney stones in children can also cause pain in the child's waist or groin, but patients with this disease are generally younger, such as Kobayashi's baby at the beginning of the article, who suffered from kidney stones in only five months. Children of this age cannot clearly describe their own situation, so there will be crying, and when the disease is more serious, the child will also have symptoms of pallor, vomiting, and cold sweat.
Kidney stones cause pain in the waist or groin because the kidneys are closer to the waist and groin, and when the stones rub against the kidneys, they cause kidney pain, and then radiate to the nearer waist and groin, causing pain in these areas.
The above belongs to the acute stage symptoms of children's kidney stones, and some children will have chronic stage symptoms of kidney stones, which are usually not obvious and generally generally systemic, such as emaciation, loss of appetite, growth retardation and so on.
If you find that your child has these symptoms, consider that you may have kidney stones in your child.
After a preliminary understanding of children's kidney stones, let's continue to return to the topic just now, feeding the baby complementary food may cause kidney stones?
Second, doctors: it is the scourge of complementary food, and many families are still feeding it like this
The incidence of kidney stones in children is low, but a large part of them are related to feeding complementary foods, and many families are still feeding their babies in the wrong way.
So, what are some of the wrong complementary feeding methods that can cause kidney stones?
The first is to feed your baby complementary foods prematurely.
At birth, the baby's digestive system is extremely fragile, only suitable for eating breast milk, breast milk is the most perfect food for newborns, not only easy to digest and absorb, but also the nutrients in it can fully meet the baby's growth needs. Only after the baby's 4 to 6 months, the nutrition in breast milk can not meet the needs of growth and development, then it is suitable to gradually start feeding complementary food.
If the baby is fed complementary food too early, the baby's fragile stomach cannot fully digest and absorb the food, which is easy to induce gastrointestinal diseases. Not only that, at this time, the metabolic function of the kidneys is not fully developed, and the impurities in the complementary food cannot be completely eliminated after entering the kidneys, which is easy to induce kidney stones in the long run.
The second is to feed the baby broth, bone broth and other complementary foods.
Many parents think that their children should start to supplement calcium from an early age, so they feed a series of things such as chicken soup and rib soup to very young babies that they think can supplement calcium, but this practice is very wrong.
When the baby drinks too much bone broth, it will not only play a role in calcium supplementation, but also make him consume too much oxalic acid.
Studies have confirmed that oxalic acid is one of the important culprits that induce kidney stones. This substance reacts in the kidneys with calcium ions in your baby's body, causing accumulation that can induce kidney stones.
In addition, some mothers may have insufficient milk, in order to ensure the health of their children, they will be fed some formula milk as a supplementary food while feeding breast milk. This behavior itself is not bad, but improper feeding of milk powder may also cause kidney stones, the most common is the concentration of milk powder is too high, long-term use of mineral water to wash milk powder and so on.
Some parents and friends will worry that the baby will not be full when brewing milk powder, so they add a lot of milk powder and put in very little water in the hope that the child can eat more nutrients, but this practice is very wrong. When the concentration of milk powder is too high, it will exceed the absorption capacity of the baby's stomach and intestines and the metabolic capacity of the kidneys, which is very easy to cause gastrointestinal diseases and kidney diseases such as kidney stones.
Some parents and friends think that it is better to use mineral water to make milk powder for their babies, but this idea is not correct. Mineral water has a high content of various minerals, and when the baby drinks mineral water for a long time to make milk powder, it will cause excessive minerals to accumulate in its body, which is more likely to induce kidney stones.
Adding complementary foods to your baby in the wrong way can cause serious diseases such as kidney stones, so how to correctly add complementary foods to your baby?
Third, the correct addition of complementary foods to do this!
Correct addition of complementary foods, the first thing to pay attention to is the baby's age, the earliest can not be earlier than four months, and the latest can not be later than seven months, too early or too late is not conducive to the baby's growth.
When starting to add complementary foods, pay attention to the gradual, from thin to thick as the principle. At first, you can first feed some meta-liquid foods such as rice soup and rotten porridge, and then gradually feed relatively "thick" foods such as fruit puree, egg soup, and noodles, and gradually develop into a normal diet over time.
In this process, we must pay attention to the speed of changing food, and do not rush to let the baby eat food that exceeds its digestive capacity.
When the baby is young, the choice of complementary foods is light, and only a small amount of salt and sugar can be added to taste, and foods containing additives must not be consumed.
The addition of complementary foods should also follow the principle of from less to more. When you first add complementary foods, you should also use breast milk as the main food, and only let the baby touch a small amount of complementary foods to slowly adapt. Then gradually increase the amount of complementary food, and finally replace breast milk as the child's staple food. Doing so can avoid problems with your baby's difficulty adapting to complementary foods in the short term.
When adding complementary foods, it is also necessary to pay attention not to select too many varieties at one time, and to follow the principle of from one to many. This not only avoids exceeding your baby's ability to digest, but also screens out foods that your baby may be allergic to.
In the process of adding complementary foods, if you find that your baby is unwell, you must stop immediately, which may be an allergy to a certain food or beyond the baby's tolerance. If the discomfort tends to worsen, go to the hospital as soon as possible and follow the doctor's instructions for treatment.
Fourth, write at the end
Baby is the future and hope of every family, everyone hopes that they can grow up healthy and happy, the addition of complementary foods is very important, but we must pay attention to the right method.
In the process of baby's growth, we must not add complementary foods to it prematurely, and when the baby reaches the age, it is also necessary to gradually add complementary foods to it according to the scientific method to prevent "good intentions from doing bad things" and avoid the baby from being hurt by kidney stones.
If you find that your baby has kidney stones, don't worry too much, go to the hospital in time, and carry out standardized treatment under the guidance of a doctor, most children can be cured.
Resources:
[1] "Chinese Expert Consensus on the Diagnosis and Treatment of Pediatric Urological Stones", Lithotripsy Group of Urology Branch of Chinese Medical Association, Chinese Journal of Urology
[2] "Children's reasonable calcium supplementation, do you know these contents?" Chinese Maternal and Child Health Research, August 23, 2019
[3] "Infant and toddler food supplements, this guide is worth a look! 丨Guide Consensus", Chinese Maternal and Child Health Research, June 21, 2019
[4] World Health Organization and UNICEF. (2003). Global strategy for infant and young child feeding. Geneva: World Health Organization.2003.