Could breastfeeding reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes?

[DCUK NewsBot]

Breastfeeding is associated with a 30% reduction in risk of a mother developing type 2 diabetes, according to a new analysis. This statistic applied for women who breastfed for 12 months or more. The comparison group were mothers that breastfed for less than 12 months. A 13% reduction in risk of hypertension (high blood pressure) was also found to be associated with a year or more of breastfeeding. A US team of researchers reviewed a total of nine research studies. Four of them involved data taken from trials that had looked at the link between lactation and diabetes among 206,000 women. The remaining five studies involved around 225,000 women and reviewed the association between lactation and high blood pressure. The authors of the study note that lactation involves producing 500 calories that is then consumed by the infant. This output of calories on breastfeeding may help mothers to recover their pre-pregnancy metabolism. Dr Haitham Ahmed, senior author of the study and chair of cardiology at AdvantageCare Physicians in Brooklyn, New York, said: "In many ways it can be a reset to the adverse metabolic profile in pregnancy. "Many women are not able to breastfeed, but for those who are, that may be an excellent way to improve long term cardiovascular and metabolic health of new mothers." In the UK, feeding on breast milk alone is recommended for at least the first six months of an infant's life. The research team noted that the study had limitations, including the fact that none of the studies were ran as randomised clinical trials. The researchers concluded: "This study suggests that education about the benefits of breastfeeding for prevention of diabetes and hypertension in women is a low-risk intervention that can be easily included in daily practice and may have a positive impact on cardiovascular outcomes in mothers." The findings have been published in the JAMA Network Open journal.

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[zand]

Well it didn't work for me but I had bad depression and no appetite so probably slowed my metabolism down by feeding for 14 months and not eating enough. I got down to my pre pregnancy weight easily enough but I piled on the pounds when I stopped feeding the babe even though I still wasn't consuming a great deal of calories.

 

[Rachox]

Didn’t work for me either! Fed my two for one and two years respectively!

 

[pixie1]

To be honest, I think its a pie in the sky, all its going to do is guilt trip mother's who for a reason don't breast feed, if they go on to develop T2 diabetes.
It's one of this research which needs to be binned?

 

[HSSS]

Nor me. All 3 of mine for more than 12 months each.

Mind you I’m fairly suspicious I had GD by today’s standards. I failed every pee test (with + ‘s) I can remember but don’t recall ever having a Hb1ac or gtt (none in my main gp records), had huge babies too, so maybe B/F prolonged the time til T2 hit properly.

 

[lucylocket61]

didnt work for me, and fed all of mine.

 

[KK123]

I know it says type 2 but I had high blood pressure throughout and well after my 3 and the first one was breastfed for 12 months and the last two had me breastfeeding for 4 years non stop!

 

[pixie1]

Could almost say breast feeding causes T2 diabetes, following how people like to follow correlations.
By the way, I'm not being serious. I developed GD,