Timing of Complementary Feeding, Growth, and Risk of Non-Communicable Diseases: Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Abstract

No consensus currently exists on the appropriate age for the introduction of complementary feeding (CF). In this paper, a systematic review is conducted that investigates the effects of starting CF in breastfed and formula-fed infants at 4, 4–6, or 6 months of age (i) on growth at 12 months of age, (ii) on the development of overweight/obesity at 3–6 years of age, (iii) on iron status, and (iv) on the risk of developing (later in life) type 2 diabetes mellitus (DM2) and hypertension. An extensive literature search identified seven studies that evaluated the effects of the introduction of CF at the ages in question. No statistically significant differences related to the age at which CF is started were observed in breastfed or formula-fed infants in terms of the following: iron status, weight, length, and body mass index Z-scores (zBMI) at 12 months, and development of overweight/obesity at 3 years. No studies were found specifically focused on the age range for CF introduction and risk of DM2 and hypertension. Introducing CF before 6 months in healthy term-born infants living in developed countries is essentially useless, as human milk (HM) and formulas are nutritionally adequate up to 6 months of age.

Impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the digitization of routine pediatric practice in Spain: A nationwide survey study

“…The fact that a longer duration of breastfeeding has been related to lower rates of obesity in adulthood (29,30), probably makes it necessary to debate not only the time of maternity leave in our environment, in the public and private sectors, but also the idea that teleworking can be an easy tool for facilitating its increasing. In our survey, paediatricians did not detected an early introduction of complementary feeding, a situation that in healthy infants under 6 months does not seem to provide any benefit in developed countries (31).…”

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