Six Tricks to Help Your Baby Expel Gas

Babies need to eliminate the air they swallow while eating, nursing, or bottle feeding, otherwise it will cause discomfort and irritation.

Babies swallow a lot of air when feeding , especially through a bottle , and need help to expel it . Although it is a simple task, there are some tips to keep in mind. This article provides healthy tricks to help your child eliminate bothersome gas, as well as what are the most appropriate positions. It also refers to the other gases that the body expels, the ventoseo, and points out two exercises to promote the expulsion of the children's stools .

Babies with gases: how to help them expel them?

When feeding with breast milk , and in particular when they take a bottle, babies swallow - in addition to milk - a lot of air . This is more frequent when they are very young, newborn or one month old, and they do not control the suction technique well. This air collects inside their body and causes them discomfort, discomfort, irritation and, as a consequence, crying .

Therefore, with certain frequency during and at the end of the feeding, it is necessary to help the child to expel these gases , since it is difficult for him to do it himself. Santiago García-Tornel, associate pediatrician at the San Joan de Déu Hospital in Barcelona, ​​explains that this is a simple task. "Parents must understand that a baby's burp is normal, adults do it too," he says.

Anyway, it is advisable to take into account some tips or tricks to help the little one to expel his gases in the proper way.

Four positions to encourage the baby to expel their gases

An important key is to choose the most suitable position to promote the expulsion of these gases that are so annoying for the baby . Four postures that help eliminate gas from the child are listed below:

• On the chest . The most common way is to hold the little one on the chest, almost upright, in such a way that his head is at the level of the adult's shoulder. And it is accompanied by light tapping on his back, to stimulate burping. In these cases, it is advisable to place a towel or other cloth on the shoulder, so as not to get the clothes dirty in the event that the baby regurgitates some food, which is normal and quite common.
• Upside down . Another traditional posture is to hold the child, lying face down, on one arm of the adult. As in the previous case, with the free hand the child is tapped on the back. By its own weight, the baby presses its belly against the arm of the person holding it, and this encourages the expulsion of air. It is important that your head is always a little higher than the rest of the body .
• On the legs . The baby's body is placed in a position similar to the previous one, but instead of being supported with one arm, the adult sits and supports it on his lap.
• Sitting . When the child has grown a little and can remain seated, he is put in this position. While the chin is supported with one hand, the same light taps described for the previous poses are applied with the other.

Two tips to help your baby pass gas

The vomiting of the baby that implies the regurgitation of a little milk at the time of expelling the gases is something normal and frequent. García-Tornel, former director of the specialized journal Anales de Pediatría Continuada , explains that this reflux is due to the fact that the child's digestive tract is not yet mature and, as a consequence, sometimes the entrance of the stomach remains open.

There are, however, some tricks to help your child pass gas .

• There is no hard and fast rule about how often your baby should burp . It can be every five minutes, when changing from one breast to another or every 60 milliliters of milk, if the bottle is used. In any case, this will also depend on whether the little one is upset or restless. If he is calm, there is no need to interrupt him. All children are different, and no one better than a mother or father to know you and how often you need help with gas.
• There is also no need to worry if the baby's burping noise is not immediately heard, or if you don't even notice that the child has done it . Often the little one releases the air without making noise and goes unnoticed. "The child does not always have to burp: if he has eaten, you help him to expel the air for five or ten minutes and then he can put himself to bed", reassures this pediatrician.