Formula advice from the hospital -- anyone follow it?

Hi all,
I brought our precious bundle home on Thursday with an information sheet from the hospital on formula feeding. (I just had to get away from the midwives).
The sheet says you have to use water that's boiled within the last half hour. It says each bottle has to be made up fresh, no storing bottles in the fridge, no storing formula and each bottle has to be freshly sterilised.
We've been trying to stick to this but getting the water to cool while the baby is crying is a pain. Is this advice a bit over the top? I really don't want the baby to get sick but I don't want her crying for 10 minutes before each feed while I swill a bottle around in cold water.

You can make formula up and store in fridge for 24 hrs.

As long as water is boiled and cooled and kept in fridge if you want to make each bottle up as you go.

OR

You can steralise all bottles and make a days worth up at once and store in fridge.

OK, I used to do that with the water - boil it and then wait till it cooled with a screaming hungry baby in my arms, but then I smartened up and would have some cooled boiled water in a bottle already and then only add enough boiling water to make it the right temp - usually about half and half. The thing with sterilising is that something is only sterile whilever it is in the sterlisising solution - as soon as you take it out it isn't sterile anymore as it's been exposed to the air kwim? I would sterlise in miltons and then take them out as needed, but by the time I got to baby #4 I wasn't even doing that - just washing in hot soapy water and putting them away after they had air dried and we'd never had a problem.

Hun, noticed that you are in Vietnam at moment, so not sure if maybe the water isn't as safe :dunno: But it does sound extreme to me. I would've thought that once the water was boiled, then the safest place to store it is in the fridge..

Personally I don't premake bottles, just premeasured water in bottles. Then when I need the bottle, I just add the formula, shake and warm accordingly.

It took me a little while to work out my system, but now here is what I do:

I use an electric steriliser, so wash bottles at night after she has gone to bed and sterilise them. Then I'll take them out once it switches off and part fill the bottles with boiling water (she gets 180ml bottles so I put 100ml in). Put the lids on the bottles and then pop in the fridge. When it comes to feed time I add 80ml boiling water to the bottle (the other water is now fridge cold) and it brings it up to the right temperature, add formula and feed! I used to make up the bottles fresh everytime, but I too found it awful waiting for the bottle to cool down while I had a screaming hungry baby in my arms! It's also handy with night feeds, don't have to stand around wasting precious sleep time waiting for a bottle to cool!

i did try filling the bottles with 180ml of boiling water and leaving them on the bench until ready for a feed, but found she didn't like it quite that cool (over winter our house gets quite cold especially overnight).

That's what worked best for me, as i said it did take a little while to find the right way for me to do it, but once you nut it out and figure out what works best for you, you'll be fine! I think as long as the sterilised bottles are used within 24 hours it'll be fine. If DD only has 5 bottles in one 24 hour period, even though i still have one left over (my steriliser does 6 bottles at a time), I'll still empty it out, re-wash and re-sterilise.

I would follow the advice - based on the fact that you are in Vietnam and they may bne considering the water conditions in Vietnam when they write the things for formula use.

Can you contact a local nurse you can ask about the relevance of these guidelines to your own circumstances?

How hygeinic is the place you are living in? As long as you have access to some form of steriliser for your bottles, a refridgerator, safe drinking water, and a way to boil it, you should be fine. Sterilise your bottles - enough for 24 hours if you have them. Boil the kettle. Wash your hands thoroughly. Take your bottles straight out of the steriliser, fill them up with the boiled water (to the right amount to make up each bottle), and seal them. Let them cool, then store them in the fridge for up to 24 hours.

We store cool boiled water in our formula fridge for 24 hours before changing it and resterilising the container. If it's good enough for a children's nurse, I reckon it is good enough for anyone else.

YIKES! I didn't realise you weren't in Australia. I would be following their advice too then hun.

:

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YIKES! I didn't realise you weren't in Australia. I would be following their advice too then hun.

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Same here they know there water conditions best

Sorry, I should have clarified.
I live in Vietnam but I came home to have the baby. The hospital there was a bit too scary and my Vietnamese isn't good enough to deal with medical issues.
I'm in Queensland and this is the advice from Nambour hospital. I go back to Vietnam in January. We drink bottled water there (imported from France), so it will be the same procedure, just really expensive!

I would only boil filtered/bottled fresh water (ie. not tap water) and then do it as we do it ie boil the water in advance etc. The amount of crying bubs would do before a feed could lead to cronic wind and feeding pains. Would you like to eat after crying uncontrollably for 10 minutes?

ah! makes sense now lol
I would follow Schmickers advice then :)

We did the whole sterilising thing until the Brisbane Baby Whisperer and my lactation consultant both said to just wash the bottles very well in warm soapy water. Boil the water and let it cool in the kettle (otherwise the formula always clumps on the spoon!). They both said pre-making 24 hours worth of bottles is not a problem at all.

I use an antibacterial washing liquid and wash and rinse the bottles very, very well. I have been following this procedure since our monster turned 8 weeks. He is now 3 months and he is just fine. The principle behind not sterilising to to build up their immune system in a "safe" way.

Let me just clarify that I am an absolute cleanliness freak and it was so difficult for me to not sterilise! Now that I have seen that nothing bad has happened I am thankful for all of the extra time I save during the bottle prep for the boy :)

In my opinion, hospitals (and formula tins) often give you really stringent instructions simply because they don't want anything bad to happen and for you to then turn around and blame the institution or the product in question. Having said that, you need to do what you are comfortable with. :)

Hey GTBBIA: Yep still here :lol:

I Bottlefed Oscar. I used to make up the bottles the night before and store them in the fridge. I would sterilise up until he was about 6mths then just as someone else said wash the bottles thoroughly before using. I used to line up about 6 bottles and measure the formula according to what was needed with his age into each then put the boiling water in, give them a shake and put them in the fridge. I also used to reheat when he needed a feed the bottles in the microwave and then give another shake and feed him. Pretty sure it was about 20secs in the microwave. Have a read of Robyn Barker's Baby Love, it was the only book I found at the time that gave sensible advice of more than one page on bottle feeding, I call it my bible and it was well used with both boys and will be with this one too :D It became my 'coffee table' book.

The other thing I used to do was make up one or two extra than what I thought in case he was having a voracious day or take an extra if we were going out. He also used to drink it cold from the bottle when we went out..something I started from a young age so that I didn't have to worry about heating it up when I was out.

The formula will only last 24hrs so what you don't use you throw out and start all over again. You will find you will get into the swing of things and be very organised.

Hope all is going well with lovely Poppy.

Heather
xx

Thanks everyone for your advice.
What I've been doing so far is using boiled water from the kettle. I'm staying with my parents, who drink tea like nobody's business. So the kettle water hardly ever goes cold. It's left more than half an hour though. And in the night it's quite cool.
I tried putting the water in the fridge but it seemed to take longer to warm the water up than it did to cool the water down! And she's only really drinking 60mls now, so it's a bit tricky to half-fill bottles, although I think that's a good idea for when she's a bit bigger.
So far so good. Although my Dad seems to have an uncanny ability to boil the jug about three seconds before the baby cries. Luckily she's doesn't really get worked up and is happy to suck on a finger for a little while, just making small complaints about the service.