Mother’s embrace eases baby’s pain without sugary dose

Newborn babies are often given sugary dose before they have injection or given a blood sample. But according to latest research giving sugar dose to babies do not relieve the pain of an injection but an embrace from mother could do the job better.

The team of researchers from Briton believes that sugar simply provides as a disruption and the mother’s hug would work just as well. The research focused on the heel prick test, in which blood sample is taken from the foot in the first few days of life.

The blood samples are used to screen a wide range of life threatening diseases including cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anemia. In the study trail involving fifty-nine newborns, among them half were given a drop of sugar solution ahead of the test, others were given plain water.

The results of the trail showed that faces of those infants given sugary water relaxed quickly but test showed their brains seemed to be registering just as much pain, reported the study published in the Lancet journal. Their findings pint out that sucrose is not an effective pain easing drug.

This is particularly significant in view of the increasing evidence that pain may cause short and long term adverse effect on babies’ neurodevelopment. The outcomes of the study show that there is an imperative need for better painkiller for infants, explained Dr Rebecca Slater from University College London.

There was also a need to downsize the amount of painful methods for young babies, explained Dr Judith Meek.