Effective Interventions of Mothers in Colicky and Non-colicky Infants

Background: According to Wessel, infantile colic is defined as excessive crying which lasts more than three hours a day for more than three days a week for at least three weeks in an otherwise healthy baby. Prevalence of infantile colic has been reported to vary within the 10-40% range in different studies depending on data collection, study design and definition of colic. Despite 50 years of research about infantile colic its etiology is unknown. Some causes are mother's stress under pregnancy, postpartum depression, social factors like mother's occupation and fulltime education and other factors such as lactose intolerance, cow's milk allergy, gut contraction and parentsinfant relationship. Aim: To compare the effective interventions of mothers in colicky and non-colicky infants Method: In this cross-sectional study, 400 infants under 3 months whom had been brought to a health center for vaccination and growth monitoring were enrolled. The criteria which were taken into consideration to recognize instances of colicky infants were: the age of the infant had to be less than 3 months, colic in infants had to be diagnosed by pediatrics and infants had to be healthy otherwise. Diarrhea, vomiting, constant abdominal distention and failure to thrive were excluded as non-colic problems. Cluster sampling and then convenience sampling methods were used to gather data. A researcher-made questionnaire was also used. Result: Among all of the neonates 49% were colic and 51% were non-colic. 52.5% were boys and 47.5% were girls. Formula fed infants were more colicky than breastfed infants (62.2% vs. 53%). Conclusion: Mothers in this study used three kinds of behavioral, nutritional and medicinal interventions (either herbal remedies or chemical drugs) to control colic. In the non-colic group, mothers used more behavioral and nutritional interventions while in the colic group both herbal and chemical drugs were used more.