Intensive Skin-to-Skin Contact with Mother Influences Baby’s Gut Microbiome Development: Radboudumc Research

The gut microbiome of babies who have skin-to-skin contact with their mother for an hour every day develops differently than that of babies who have less intensive contact. This is evident from research Radboudumc Nijmegen.

The gut microbiome is the collection of bacteria and other microorganisms that live in our intestines. The microbiome plays an important role in our health, including by digesting food, producing vitamins and training our immune system. In newborn babies, the microbiome is not yet fully developed. This changes quickly in the first months of life. This happens through breastfeeding, contact with family and pets, antibiotic treatments and other factors. Researcher Henrik Eckermann of Radboud university medical center was therefore curious whether intensive skin-to-skin contact with the mother, also known as ‘kangaroo care’ mentioned, could also influence the development of the baby’s microbiome.

Kangaroo care is often used in premature babies, because it stabilizes the baby’s temperature, heart rate and breathing, among other things. But skin contact can also have benefits for full-term babies. For example, it promotes bonding between mother and child, stimulates breastfeeding and reduces crying. In addition, skin contact has a stress-reducing effect. “And stress can change the composition of the microbiome,” says Eckerman. He also suspected that through skin-to-skin contact, a baby also ingests more bacteria from the mother’s skin that influence the microbiome.

Hours a day
To test this hypothesis, a team of researchers investigated Radboudumc the feces of 21 babies who had intensive skin-to-skin contact with their mothers every day for five weeks. This meant that the babies were placed on the mother’s bare chest for an hour straight each day, wearing only a diaper. The researchers compared the results with the stool of 23 babies who received usual care, and where skin-to-skin contact could therefore differ throughout the day. To investigate this, they took samples of stool at 2, 5 and 52 weeks after birth. Eckermann: “We then looked at various aspects such as which bacteria were present in the intestines, which metabolites they were likely to produce and how changeable the composition of bacteria was over time.” In addition, the team looked at how mature the microbiome was compared to the age of the infant.

Fewer differences
These analyzes showed that the microbiome of the babies who had intensive skin contact with their mothers was less pronounced compared to that of the other babies. “We saw that the composition of the microbiome was more stable in this first group,” explains Eckermann. “We also saw that the development into an adult microbiome took slightly longer in these babies.” The researchers do not yet know whether these differences are positive or negative.

Intestines and brain
Eckermann points out that the communication between the intestines and the brain is very complex, and much is still unknown about it. “We currently know more than forty metabolic pathways that are involved in the communication between the intestines and the brain.” A possible hypothesis is that skin-to-skin contact reduces stress, which may ensure that there is little change in the bacterial composition. “But we cannot yet draw clear conclusions about this.”

Good for the mother
Although it remains to be determined whether the contact is positive for the babies’ microbiomes, it is clear that the intensive skin-to-skin contact has benefits for mothers. The mothers who nursed their babies for an hour every day were less anxious and tired and breastfed longer than the mothers compared to the control group. In addition, their babies slept more and cried less than the babies in the control group.

Eckermann hopes that his research will contribute to more awareness about the importance of skin-to-skin contact for the health of the baby. “It is a simple and cheap intervention that can have many positive effects,” he says. “We would like to do more research into the long-term effects of skin-to-skin contact on the baby’s microbiome and health.” Not only for premature children, but also for full-term babies.

2024-02-10 08:28:16
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