Acupuncture May Reduce the Need for Formula Feeding in Mothers After Cesarean Delivery: Secondary Analysis of the Data from a Randomized Clinical Trial

Background: Acupuncture may improve breastfeeding in women after cesarean delivery (CD). In a recent randomized controlled trial (RCT), acupuncture was used for pain control in patients undergoing elective CD. This secondary analysis aimed to assess the potential influence of acupuncture on the need for additional formula feeding in this cohort of patients. Methods: Body weight of newborns, frequency of meconium release during the first 3 days of life, the day of first normal defecation, the starting day of additional formula milk feeding and duration of additional milk nutrition were extracted from the neonatal database of the University Medicine of Greifswald for 180 women from a recent RCT and analyzed post hoc according to group allocation from the original RCT: acupuncture ( N = 60), placebo acupuncture ( N = 60) and standard care alone ( N = 60) using the unpaired Student t -test, Mann–Whitney U test and Fischer’s exact test where appropriate with Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons. Results: Data of 189 newborns (9 twin pairs) were analyzed. The mean weight of all newborns decreased on the 2nd and 3rd days following CD in comparison with baseline by 6.2% ( p < 0.02), and started to increase on the 4th day. The median duration of additional formula milk consumption in newborns of mothers who received acupuncture was shorter than that of mothers in the placebo group: 3 (2–4) days versus 4.5 (4–7) days ( p < 0.001) and of mothers in the standard care group, with 5 (3–7) days ( p = 0.006). Conclusions: Acupuncture may reduce the need for formula feeding in mothers after CD. This should be verified in a prospective randomized investigation.