Dr. Satyen K Hemrajani

Many babies especially between 1.5 to 5 month of age have the tendency to cry excessively and recurrently  especially during morning hours or evening hours without and obvious cause . This is called as infantile colic. A lot of time this may be due to the common causes which are disturbing the baby like hunger, overclothing , keep the baby in a very warm temperature which makes the baby fretful and cry a lot. If it is associated with fever of more than 100 o F or is associated with distended abdomen or extreme lethargy then this needs urgent medical attention and should be shown to a pediatrician.

To avoid this the mother should take care of early clues to hunger or irritability and should tackle them early. Most of the time simple measures like rocking the baby gently or using gentle massage or tickling and interacting with the baby may help in subsiding the episode. Certain ingredients in mother's diet who are breastfeeding may also aggravate this like caffeine, alcohol, vegetables like cauliflower, cabbage, etc and red chilli peppers. They should be avoided. Keeping the baby in tummy down and gently back rubbing may help. Gripe water and giving herbal medicine may be harmful and may not help but gentle application of hing around umbilicus may help in reducing the symptoms and severity of colic. It is also important to remain patient during these episodes and do not violently shake the baby or loose your temper. This may lead to severe damages to the infant's body organs.