Dr. McDougall's Online Discussion Board

Recently I've heard of women using goats milk for babies. I'd be worried my child's first word might be

"dahhahhhhaaddaahhhdyy"

Seriously, why do educated people do this?

If a mother's milk production is light, what is the best supplementation? I'd think some sort of juicing or smoothie with some leafy greens, fruits and veggies??

BUY breast milk.

RandyKreill wrote:Recently I've heard of women using goats milk for babies.

Good idea if the "kids" are actually baby goats.

Seriously, why do educated people do this?

Goat's milk is easier for humans to digest than cow's milk. But "better" does not mean "good."

I used to be in the La Leche League, and we were always told that the more the baby sucked at the breast, the more milk would be produced. But the key is keeping the baby at the breast. When moms are working, they may not have time to keep the baby sucking long and often enough to stimulate really good milk production. Subsidized maternity leaves of a year or more could go a long way towards improving breastfeeding rates in our country, along with a breastfeeding education and promotion campaign.

Oh how I would love it if we had subsidized maternity leave in this country! I only get 6 weeks and i really want to breastfeed! I will probably have to go to part time because of this (which I suppose defeats the corporate goal of minimizing reduced productivity due to pregnancy and maternity leave! ) Maybe we should all move to Sweden!!

Oh and I did mean to respond to the goat's milk thing too. Cow's milk before one year of age leads to anemia (sometimes very severe) in babies. I would assume that although goat's milk might be better than cow's in this respect that the possibility of anemia is still pretty high. As a family doc, I am constantly trying to discourage people from giving their children milk before 12 months (if at all) and the goat's milk camp tend to be very hard to convince. I've actually seen a baby get down to a hemoglobin of 5 because of cow's milk consumption!! Anyway, I definitely do not understand why otherwise intelligent people do this. Babies should have human breastmilk for as long as possible, not the breastmilk of another species. OK, getting off my soapbox now...

In my opinion the best thing for women with "light" milk production to do is breastfeed more. It's all about supply and demand!! But, if milk supply is really a problem, I believe I read at least from Dr. Fuhrman that hydrolyzed milk protein-based formula was the best alternative in his opinion because soy formula is so processed and almost all is GMO. I don't know how I feel about this to be completely honest. I think I'd rather go soy for my child because I think dairy is horrible. I definitely don't think juicing would be a good substitute because it would not provide the amount of nutrients needed for a growing baby, particularly fats, which are very important for baby's brain development. Babies have much higher fat requirements than adults. Non-dairy milk definitely should not be substituted for formula as it doesn't have the required nutrients as a sole formula either. I'm not sure what Dr. McDougall's opinion on this issue is. Anyway, sorry for three separate posts!

I think breastfeeding is the best way to increase production of milk which also avoid chances of breast cancer but if mother finds difficulty then buying a milk bottle is not a bad option because baby get all the essential nutrients which is available in mother's milk.

For those interested, goat's milk and cow's milk are for the most part identical from a nutritional standpoint. The casein faction of protein is about the same although unique and the fat content is slightly higher. What's interesting is that fat content of mother's milk is higher than either cow's or goat's milk and surprise, cholesterol is higher also.