Gastric empying at birth: good or bad practice?

My opinion is that it is equivalent to throw away the first reserve of feed.

Mirko Spacapan

NICU Udine ITALY

Dear Mirko,

to my opinion there is no general need in doing so, i consider the trauma by unneccesary suction higher than the theoretical benefit of it. You might just get vagal stimulation.

Our practice at the Karolinska Hospital is no suction if there is no special need for it.

Alexander Rakow

Karolinska Hospital

Dep. of Neonataology

Dear Mirko:

Here in Mexico, there is a routine to make a gastric lavage at born,personally I think there is no reason to do it, some neonates that swallowed a regular amount of maternal blood, probably have some intolerance feeding at the begining, but are very few, so in general I consider that this practice have no reason to do it

Hello ,I am a NICU RN working a neonatologist that use only the bulb suction

so most of the babies are having trouble feeding or need gastric lavage.

I n my opinion if the first suction was done deeply so no need for routine gastric lavage.

RN-NICU

hi,

in Guatemala, at Roosevelt Hospital specialy, there is a routine to make a gastric lavage at born, because you can made the diagnosis esophageal atresia, duodenale atresia, coanal nasal atresia.

No need unless the infant is vomiting whether there is MSL or not.

Regards

K P Sanghvi

no need unless the baby is vomiting

In our unit at naval hosp Karachi Pakistan,we only do gastric lavage if baby is vomiting repeatedly or has coffee ground aspirate but not as a routine.I consider routine lavages as unneccessary and could potentially lead to vagal stimulation.

We are doing gastric lavage only when we know about bloody amniotic fluid and the baby is at risk of aspirating the bloody amniotic fluid.

I think ,routinly it's not needed ,because it can make vagal stimulation.Don' foget even more serious complication such as perforation.

gastric lavage should not be done as a routine care. The newborn usually will tell you if he is gonna need one...