Journal on Developmental Disabilities

Abstract

Commercially-available infant formulae are designed to provide infants with the same nutritional value as breast milk; however, there are many biological components (i.e., maternally-derived antibodies) that cannot be reproduced. There is evidence in the literature to support the hypothesis that feeding with breast milk provides benefits to the infant in terms of development and cognitive outcome. The most studied components of breast milk are the long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, specifically docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) and arachidonic acid (AA). These non-essential fatty acids have been shown to provide a measurable advantage to breast-fed infants over their formula-fed counterparts on childhood scales of cognitive development. Recently, DHA and AA were approved as additives to infant formulae in North America. Breast milk also contains a number of growth factors and hormones that are known to have neural developmental effects, but these effects have not been quantified on behavioural scales. There are also still many more unidentified components of breast milk. Efforts to educate and encourage the feeding of breast milk over infant formulae are underway from the community to international level, with the World Health Organization publishing guidelines on the optimal duration for breastfeeding. It should be noted that there are certain advantages of some formulae over breast milk, most significantly the fact that formulae contain no contaminants (i.e., medications and their metabolites) from the maternal diet.

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