Breastfeeding Duration and Tongue-tie in Neonates.

Exclusive breastfeeding is defined as feeding the infant with human breast milk only, except for vitamins, minerals supplements and medicine. It is an official recommendation that infants are exclusively breastfed for 6 months. Approximately 60% and 15% of Danish infants are exclusively breastfed for 4 and 6 months respectively. There are many factors that may interfere with the establishment and duration of breastfeeding.

For the infant, breastfeeding depends on the infant´s ability to seal the oral cavity around the breast and integrate the muscular activities of cheeks, lips, jaw, and tongue. Effectively nutritive sucking occurs due to the application of positive pressure when the tongue moves upwards to express milk, followed by an intra-oral vacuum (vacuum) when the tongue moves downwards and draws milk from the breast by suction. The strength of vacuum affects the effectiveness of milk removal from the breast and regulates the volume of milk. A weak vacuum may, therefore, lead to a shortage of milk transfer, diminished milk supply and early breastfeeding stop. Conversely, was in a recently published study found an association between a high vacuum and infants who were exclusively breastfed for the recommended 6 months.

Difficulties in creating an appropriate vacuum may be related to ankyloglossia, tight frenulum also called tongue-tie, a condition in which the lingual frenulum has anterior attachment near the tip of the tongue and/or are unusually thick, tight, and/or short lingual frenulum. Tongue-tie is often detected when the infant shows signs of difficulties during breastfeeding and/or there is maternal nipple pain. The possible consequence of tongue-tie is insufficient infant weight gain, neonatal dehydration, and shortened breastfeeding duration.

In case of breastfeeding difficulties, it is recommended to evaluate the tongue-tie by the Breastfed Babies Assessment Tool score (TABBY) and depending on this assessment frenotomy may be recommended. The value of both the TABBY score and frenotomy is only poorly validated.

Hypothesis We hypothesise vacuum to increase after frenotomy and, thereby, affect breastfeeding duration positively.

Inclusion criteria

Infant of an adult mother Delivery after 37 completed gestational weeks. Singleton or twin Infant of a mother who intends to breastfeed. At least one parents speak and write English, Danish, Norwegian, or Swedish.

Exclusion criteria

Congenital malformation. Reduced lung function.