Child Ailments Linked to Breast Feeding, Implants

Researchers found a handful of children nationwide who developed serious digestive problems after being breast-fed by mothers with silicone implants.

The implants appear to be to blame, but studies of large numbers of children are needed to know how rare the cases are, researchers said in today’s issue of The Journal of The American Medical Assn.

Dr. Jeremiah J. Levine, the study’s lead author, said no blanket recommendation on breast feeding by women with implants should be made until more research is done.

The study involved 11 children, ages 1 1/2 to 13, born to women with silicone breast implants. Eight of the children were breast-fed, and three were fed formula as newborns.

All 11 later suffered from bouts of abdominal pain, plus other symptoms, such as vomiting, difficulty swallowing, intestinal pain and slow weight gain. Some also had joint pain or rashes.

Those symptoms are common to children’s ailments. But in six of the eight breast-fed children, the symptoms arose from an uncommon origin--loss of normal movement in the lower part of the esophagus, the tube that moves food from the mouth to the stomach. Loss of movement in the lower esophagus usually only arises from a disorder called scleroderma, an ailment that afflicts some women with silicone breast implants, Levine said.