neokare – Human milk scientific papers

When new products appear on the market, there is an initial suspicion from the medical community. Given their heavy workload, many do not have time to read the scientific literature in depth. Others receive support from the multi-billion dollar cow milk fortifier industry. Thus, it often falls on concerned parents to advocate for the use and acceptance of new products. In addition, in the nutritional supplement industry some companies use fake science or make unsubstantiated claims to sell their products. We at NeoKare are different. The scientific papers below illustrate some of the science behind our products. Chances are, these will not be understandable for non-biologists. However,  we make them accessible here for two reasons. 1. To show parents that our products are developed based on solid scientific foundations and  2. To help you advocate for their use when a physician or dietician claims that our products provide no proven benefits.

1.

The following review article, some of which may be understood even by parents, summarises the role of human milk components in the development of the immune system, the gut and brain of preterm babies: Dimitroglou M, Iliodromiti Z, Christou E, Volaki P, Petropoulou C, Sokou R, Boutsikou T, Iacovidou N. Human Breast Milk: The Key Role in the Maturation of Immune, Gastrointestinal and Central Nervous Systems: A Narrative Review. Diagnostics (Basel). 2022 Sep 12;12(9):2208.

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2.

O’Connor DL, Kiss A, Tomlinson C, Bando N, Bayliss A, Campbell DM, Daneman A, Francis J, Kotsopoulos K, Shah PS, Vaz S, Williams B, Unger B. Nutrient enrichment of human milk with human and bovine milk–based fortifiers for infants born weighing <1250 g: a randomized clinical trial, The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, Volume 108, Issue 1, 2018, Pages 108-116

In this study 49.2% of preterm babies receiving cow milk-based fortifier died or suffered serious complications. In babies receiving the human milk-derived fortifier the same figure was reduced to 35.9%. Sepsis (an extremely severe infection) affected 23% of the cow milk fortifier treated babies, while in the human fortifier group this decreased to 12.5%. Looking at Figure 3, the human fortifier reduced the development of almost all tested complications associated with prematurity. Yet, the way the statistical analysis was conducted, led to the conclusion that there was no statistical difference between the two groups.

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3.

The other study often cited by the opponents of human milk-based fortifiers is:

Jensen GB, Domellöf M, Ahlsson F, Elfvin A, Navér L, Abrahamsson T. Effect of human milk-based fortification in   extremely preterm infants fed exclusively with breast milk: a randomised controlled trial, eClinicalMedicine, Volume 68, 2024.

This is a similar trial where preterm babies where the mothers’ milk was fortified with either cow milk or human milk-based fortifier. In this well conducted study, there was no difference in the number of babies suffering from necrotising enterocolitis (NEC), a very serious complication of prematurity. However, while in the cow milk-based fortifier group more than 50 % of these patients died, only one NEC-related death was seen in the group receiving the human fortifier (look at tables 2 and 3 if you want to check the numbers yourself). In addition, the human fortifier was protective against another complication, bronchopulmonary dysplasia. (To see this benefit, you need to download supplementary table S4 that shows differences as non-intuitive odds ratios.) Yet, due to the statistical approach used, the authors concluded that there was no extra benefit derived from the human fortifier.

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