Related Experiment Video
Updated: Nov 23, 2025
Author Spotlight: Implications of Non-Nutritive Sucking on Speech Emergence and Infant Development
Published on: April 19, 2024
New methods and tools to assess nutritive sucking in new-borns: effect of different feeding bottles on nutritive
F Taffoni1, V Focaroli2,3, A M Visco4
1Advanced Robotics and Human-Centred Technologies - CREO Lab, Università Campus Bio-Medico di Roma, Rome, Italy.
Insights
Different feeding bottles can impact infant feeding performance. This study introduces a method to objectively assess how bottles affect nutritive sucking in healthy newborns, aiding bottle design and infant development.
Area of Science:
- Pediatrics
- Infant Nutrition
- Biomedical Engineering
Background:
- Nutritive sucking is crucial for infant nourishment and development.
- Impaired feeding can lead to delayed growth and developmental issues.
- Limited research exists on how feeding bottles affect healthy newborns' feeding performance.
Purpose of the Study:
- To propose a method for the functional characterization of feeding bottles.
- To objectively assess the impact of different feeding bottles on infant feeding performance.
- To identify reliable indices for quantitatively evaluating feeding skills in clinical settings.
Main Methods:
- Instrumented two different feeding bottles with a feeding monitoring device.
- Recruited thirty healthy newborns for feeding trials.
- Quantitatively assessed feeding performance using established clinical indices.
Main Results:
- Demonstrated objective assessment of feeding bottle impact on infant feeding performance.
- Identified key performance differences between the two tested bottles.
- Validated the proposed method for functional bottle characterization.
Conclusions:
- The proposed method offers a novel approach to functionally characterizing feeding bottles.
- Objective assessment can reveal bottle-specific influences on nutritive sucking.
- Further research with more bottles and infants is warranted to confirm findings.
Abstract:
Nutritive sucking is a fundamental process assuring the primary infant nourishment in the first months of life. When feeding is impaired for pathological conditions, the growth of the infant may be delayed with a cascade effect on the overall development. While literature studied nutritive sucking development in infants with feeding problems, like in severe premature babies or with low weight at birth, few works assesses to what extent different feeding bottles may influence feeding performance of healthy new-borns. This work proposes a method for functional characterization of feeding bottles based on the most promising and reliable indices used to quantitatively assess feeding skills in clinical applications. Thirty healthy newborns have been fed with two different bottles instrumented with a device for feeding monitoring. Their impact on feeding performance is objectively assessed and discussed. The approach presented here, even if preliminary, paves the way to a new method for functional characterization of feeding bottles. Further studies may allow to confirm our analyses with a higher number of bottles and infants.
More Related Videos
07:11Assessment of the Efficacy of An Osteopathic Treatment in Infants with Biomechanical Impairments to Suckling
Published on: February 5, 2019
05:04A Common Marmoset Model of Mother-Infant Intervention for Breastfeeding Disorders in the Presence of Paternal Inhibition and Maternal Neglect
Published on: September 22, 2023
Related Concept Videos
01:15Enteral Nutrition II: Nasointestinal and Gastrostomy Feeding
Nasointestinal Feeding
Nasointestinal feeding involves placing a tube...
01:26Enteral Nutrition I: Orogastric and Nasogastric Feeding
Orogastric (OG) and nasogastric (NG) feeding are two standard methods used for enteral nutrition. Enteral nutrition is often preferred over...