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ANNUAL BABY REPORT
| C things you
±\J to care for
Important lessons from the latest research
Forget sugar and spice and
everything nice. Your little one
is a lot more complicated than
that USA WEEKEND wants to
make sure you have a recipe for
success, so each year we sift
through the most recent scien
tific studies and research to compile this list of
the 15 most important findings you need to know.
FVom getting Baby to love her green beans to
avoiding tooth decay, we’ve got you covered so
your child can be the focus.
1 | Help kids
JL i eat veggies.
▼ “Ignore the faces Baby
makes when you intro
duce new foods,” says
lgg§ Julie Mennella, one of
% ajggk the authors of a study
—— published in Pediatrics
that found repeated
jL r exposure to veggies
increased babies’ con-
P sumption. “We gave babies
a taste of green beans for several
r days, and after about eight days,
they were more willing to eat it.
They learn to like their veggies.”
21 Lower Baby’s allergy risk.
I Breast-feeding for four to six months may
protect against food allergies, says a newly pub
lished policy statement from the American Acad
emy of Pediatrics (AAP). “If you can’t breast-feed
and you have a history of allergies, choose a low
6
USA WEEKEND • Feb. 29-March 2.2008
allergen formula that’s not the regular milk or
soy-based formulas,” says Scott Sicherer, M.D.,
author of Understanding and Managing Your
Child’s Food Allergies. “Also, hold off on solid food
until your baby is about 4 to 6 months.”
3| Try honey.
lln January, »
the Food and Drug \
Administration advised
that children under age 2
should not be given over-the- ""
counter cough and cold medi
cines because of potential side
effects that include rapid heart rates, convulsions
and death. Instead, soothe your child’s cough
with a teaspoon of honey. A study done by re
searchers at Penn State Children’s Hospital in
Hershey, Pa., compared a teaspoon of buckwheat
honey, honey-flavored cough suppressant and
no treatment in 105 children with an upper res
piratory tract infection and found that honey
worked best at calming coughs. However, do
not give honey to babies under the age of 1, as
there are rare but severe side effects, including
infantile botulism. Instead, when Baby gets a
cough or cold, treat symptoms with non-aspirin
pain reliever and saline nose drops.
41 Quit smoking.
I Researchers at Monell
Chemical Senses Center in
Philadelphia found that if
Mom smoked before breast
feeding, her baby’s sleep w r as dis
rupted, and Baby slept for a shorter
need to know
Baby
period of time. “Ideally, Mom «
will quit smoking,” says Men
nella, who co-authored the A
study. “But if she doesn’t ffijplj, ■
quit, she can time the J|
breast-feeding so that H
Baby is minimally ex-
posed to the nicotine n
in the milk. It gets
into the milk within a I|fim
•—* half-hour of smoking ’
and takes two to three
hours to leave the body.”
5| Take a test.
I Well-child visits take about
15 to 30 minutes and cover
many issues, including /IBIE
vaccination schedules,
so it’s no surprise that
when pediatricians are try
ing to cover so much territory, they fail
to identify up to 80% of developmental delays
in kids. In a Pediatrics study, researchers found
that when parents completed a screening test
in which they answered questions about their
baby’s development, referral rates for
continued evaluation increased by 224%.
“Push your doctor to use a standardized
r jk developmental tool,” says Hollie Hix-
Small, one of the study’s authors. She
suggests completing the Ages &
Stages questionnaire at asq
ABka .uoregon.edu. “It gives parents
a better understanding of where
then- child should be.”
Cover story illustrations by Bob Staake for USA WEEKEND