G'day Megan,
Nothing non-scientific about your therapy. Breast milk contains an
antibiotic called "Immunoglobin A" that is a good supressor of the
bacteria causing conjunctivitis (or other eye infection). There are
not many scientific trials that show this (mainly because there isn't
much money in proving the value of breast milk) but have a look at:
http://ijms.sums.ac.ir/9812/pishva9812.html
The abstract reads:
ABSTRACT The effect of topical application of human breast milk in
prevention of neonatal conjunctivitis was determined. Five hundred
and sixty-five newborns were randomized into two groups, the first
group consisting of 327 newborns, received topical breast milk prior
to each breast feed for the first ten days of life. The second group
of 238 babies received no treatment and served as control.
Conjunctivitis appeared in 9.1% of babies in group 1 and 25.6% of
newborns in the control group (p < 0.00001). The most common
microbial cause of conjunctivitis in both groups was coagulase
positive Staphylococcus. Regarding the predominance of environmental
micro-organisms as etiology of conjunctivitis in newborns and anti-
inflammatory and antimicrobial properties of human milk, topical
application of breast milk as a prophylactic measure in neonatal
conjunctivitis is recommended.
Cheers,
David
PS. I copied this to you as hardly any of my posts get through to
ozmid these days. Perhaps you could repost my message on ozmid.
___________________________________
David Vernon
Editor and Writer
GPO Box 2314
Canberra ACT 2601 Australia
Email: Click here to email me
Web: http://web.mac.com/david.vernon
___________________________________
On 04/02/2007, at 11:14 AM, Megan & Larry wrote:
Thought you might enjoy a story on my breastmilk curing my sons eye
infection.
My 7 year old has an infection in a gland under his eyelid and
after an initial miss-diagnosis of conjunctivitis by a GP, I
discovered a sore on his inner eyelid. (mothers make better GP's
sometimes)
Another appt at GP's and was offered a 6 day course of antibiotics
or bathe the eye every half hour with salt water and wait and see.
I had already told GP I had started using breastmilk in his eye, to
which was the expected blank look and no further mention.
So off I go with script incase and home to bathe away with my milk.
After doing this all day yesterday, my son's eye is drastically
better and with further care today, all will be healed. No
antibiotics and a win for breastmilk.
I plan on writing this GP a letter telling him that I used
breastmilk instead of salt water or antibiotics and perhaps in
future he may consider it a worthy treatment.
To support my "non-scientific" therapy is there any articles
spelling out how this can work which I could include in my letter?
(Of course mothers have used their milk for treating eyes and
whatever else forever)
Thanks in advance
Megan
