What Is Marine Collagen?

Collagen is the most abundant protein in your body. You can find it in your:

• Bones
• Muscles
• Tendons
• Ligaments
• Organs
• Blood vessels
• Intestines
• Tissue
• Skin

Your body starts to make less collagen as you age, starting in your mid-20s. Poor diet can lower your levels, too. When your body doesn’t make as much collagen, it can lead to things like:

• Wrinkles
• Weak muscles
• Tight ligaments and tendons
• Joint pain
• Gut issues

Marine, or fish, collagen comes from the skin of fish. It can help you bring your levels up. You may already take supplements or use cosmetics with collagen in them. In most of these products, the collagen comes from pig and cow skins.

Recently, more people have been opting for fish collagen for a few different reasons.

Benefits

Like other sources of collagen, marine collagen may help delay some signs of aging, like wrinkles, joint issues, and weakness.

Besides the anti-aging benefits, fish collagen also provides an alternative to people who have issues about using other forms of collagen.

Those issues include:

Religious concerns. Some people aren’t able to use collagen made from pigs and cows because of their faiths.

Worry about disease. Some people worry that the proteins used in collagen products could link to mad cow disease.

Some also consider marine collagen a more sustainable alternative. The fishing industry often has a lot of unused raw materials from the fish they catch, including the fish skins where marine collagen comes from.

So fish collagen offers a more economic and environmentally friendly option for cosmetic companies. Instead of wasting fish skins, companies can use the excess materials to create skin care products.

Uses

You can use fish collagen as a supplement. It comes in powder, pill, or liquid forms. People also use creams made with it.

Sources:

Cleveland Clinic: “The Best Way You Can Get More Collagen.”

Cedars Sinai: “Collagen for Your Skin: Healthy or Hype.”

Marine Drugs: “Effect of Fish Collagen Hydrolysates on Type I Collagen mRNA Levels of Human Dermal Fibroblast Culture.”

Iron is important for brain development and making new red blood cells to prevent a low red blood cell count.

When your baby or child may need an iron supplement (ferrous sulphate) and how to give it.

What is Iron for?

Iron is vital for body function. It is especially important for brain development and making new red blood cells to prevent a low red blood cell count (anaemia).

Why do some children need extra iron?

Iron supplements are used to prevent or treat a lack of iron (iron deficiency). This can cause anaemia. Babies and children with anaemia are often pale and tired. They may not grow and develop properly. Iron supplements help your child to make more haemoglobin and increase their iron stores.

Babies in the last few months of pregnancy, your baby stores iron in their body to use after they are born. Well-grown, full-term babies have stored enough iron to use until they are 6 months old.

Premature babies (who are born early, before 36 weeks) or babies who are small (who weigh less than 2.5 kg at birth) do not have as much iron stored in their body. What iron they do have is used up as they grow. They need extra iron to prevent iron deficiency. Breast milk contains very little iron.

Children; Low iron in children can be caused by not getting enough iron in their diet, having problems with how their body absorbs iron (such as in coeliac disease), or blood loss such as in inflammatory bowel disease.

How much iron does my child need?

Your child’s iron dose depends on their weight. Your doctor may increase the dose as your child grows and gains weight.

Iron may be prescribed once or twice daily. Your doctor will tell you how much to give your child.

How long will my child need iron?

It’s recommended that you start giving iron when your baby is between 4 and 6 weeks old. Depending on how premature your baby was, you may need to start giving iron in hospital, or you may start giving it after you go home. Keep giving iron each day until your child’s first birthday or your doctor asks you to stop.

Iron absorbs better on an empty stomach so try to give it 30 minutes before a feed or a meal or 1 hour after a feed or a meal.

What if my child vomits?

If your child vomits less than 30 minutes after giving the iron, give the same dose again. If it is more than 30 minutes, do not give another dose until it is next due.

How will the iron affect my child?

Your child may react to the taste, but this does not mean it is a problem. Your child’s poo (bowel motions) may become a darker colour, but this is harmless.

When should the iron start working?

It takes 3 to 4 weeks for the iron stores to build up in the body. Usually iron needs to be taken for at least 3 months for it to have full benefit.

References

1. Iron (ferrous sulphate) for premature and small babiesKidsHealth, NZ
2. Iron deficiencyStarship, NZ

What Is Calcium? 

Calcium is a mineral that builds strong bones. It helps the body in lots of other ways too. Calcium keeps the nerves and muscles working. It also plays a role in keeping the heart healthy.

Why Do Kids Need Calcium?

We only get one chance to build strong bones when we’re kids and teens. Children who get enough calcium start their adult lives with the strongest bones possible. That protects them against bone loss later in life.

Young kids and babies need calcium and vitamin D to prevent a disease called rickets. Rickets softens the bones and causes bow legs, stunted growth, and sometimes sore or weak muscles.

Where Does Calcium Come From?

Calcium is found in food. Some foods are very high in calcium. Dairy foods like these are among the best natural sources of calcium:

• Milk
• Yogurt
• Hard cheeses, like cheddar

The percentage of fat in milk and other dairy foods doesn’t affect their calcium content — nonfat, 1%, 2%, or whole all have about the same amount of calcium. Your health care provider will let you know which type of milk is right for your child.

How Much Calcium Does My Child Need?

Calcium is measured in milligrams (mg). We need different amounts at different stages of life. It’s best if kids get most of their calcium from food. If that’s not possible, health care providers might suggest a calcium supplement.

Babies

Babies get their calcium from breast milk or formula:

• Babies younger than 6 months old need 200 mg of calcium a day.
• Babies 6 to 11 months old need 260 mg of calcium a day.

The only types of milk babies should have been breast milk or formula. Don’t give cow’s milk, goat’s milk, or homemade formula to babies younger than 1 year old..

Kids and Teens

Kids need more calcium as they get older to support their growing bones:

• Kids 1 to 3 years old need 700 mg of calcium a day (2–3 servings).
• Kids 4 to 8 years old need 1,000 mg of calcium a day (2–3 servings).
• Kids and teens 9 to 18 years old need 1,300 mg of calcium a day (4 servings).

How Can I Help My Child Get Enough Calcium?

Babies get all their calcium from breast milk or formula. Young kids and school-age kids who eat a healthy diet with plenty of dairy also get enough. But preteens and teens may need to add more calcium-rich foods to their diet.

What About Vitamin D?

People need vitamin D to help the body absorb calcium. Without it, calcium can’t get where it needs to go to build strong bones.

Vitamin D isn’t in many foods that kids eat. So, health care providers often recommend supplements.

Breastfed babies need a vitamin D supplement, starting soon after birth. Baby formula has vitamin D added, so babies who drink more than 32 ounces of formula a day don’t need extra vitamin D.

Ask your health care provider if your baby or child needs a vitamin D supplement.

Breastfeeding, or nursing, is the process by which human breast milk is fed to a child.

Breast milk may be from the breast, or may be expressed by hand or pumped and fed to the infant. The World Health Organization (WHO) recommends that breastfeeding begin within the first hour of a baby’s life and continue as often and as much as the baby wants.

Health organizations, including the WHO, recommend breastfeeding exclusively for six months. This means that no other foods or drinks, other than vitamin D, are typically given.

WHO recommends exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months of life, followed by continued breastfeeding with appropriate complementary foods for up to 2 years and beyond.

Of the 135 million babies born every year, only 42% are breastfed within the first hour of life, only 38% of mothers practice exclusive breastfeeding during the first six months, and 58% of mothers continue breastfeeding up to the age of two years and beyond.

Breastfeeding has a number of benefits to both mother and baby that infant formula lacks. Increased breastfeeding to near-universal levels in low and medium income countries could prevent approximately 820,000 deaths of children under the age of five annually.

Breastfeeding decreases the risk of respiratory tract infections, ear infections, sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), and diarrhea for the baby, both in developing and developed countries.

Other benefits have been proposed to include lower risks of asthma, food allergies, and diabetes.

Breastfeeding may also improve cognitive development and decrease the risk of obesity in adulthood

Benefits for the mother include less blood loss following delivery, better contraction of the uterus, and a decreased risk of postpartum depression.

Breastfeeding delays the return of menstruation, and in very specific circumstances, fertility, a phenomenon known as lactational amenorrhea.

Long-term benefits for the mother include decreased risk of breast cancer, cardiovascular disease, diabetes, metabolic syndrome, and rheumatoid arthritis.

Breastfeeding is less expensive than infant formula, but its impact on mothers’ ability to earn an income is not usually factored into calculations comparing the two feeding methods.

Feedings may last as long as 30–45 minutes each as milk supply develops and the infant learns the Suck-Swallow-Breathe pattern.

However, as milk supply increases and the infant becomes more efficient at feeding, the duration of feeds may shorten. Older children may feed less often. When direct breastfeeding is not possible, expressing or pumping to empty the breasts can help mothers avoid plugged milk ducts and breast infection, maintain their milk supply, resolve engorgement, and provide milk to be fed to their infant at a later time.

Medical conditions that do not allow breastfeeding are rare. Mothers who take certain recreational drugs should not breastfeed, however, most medications are compatible with breastfeeding.

Current evidence indicates that it is unlikely that COVID-19 can be transmitted through breast milk.

Smoking tobacco and consuming limited amounts of alcohol and/or coffee are not reasons to avoid breastfeeding