title: Intestinal permeability changes during the first month: effect of natural versus artificial feeding.
abstract: The aim of the study was to investigate the effect of age and feeding pattern on intestinal permeability during the first month of life. The subjects were 72 full-term, healthy neonates who were (a) exclusively breast-fed (BF group, n = 36) or (b) artificially fed (CM group, n = 36) with either an adapted formula (AF group, n = 17) or a partly hydrolyzed (hypoantigenic) formula (HA group, n = 19). A lactulose/mannitol (lac/man) intestinal permeability test was performed at 1 and 7 days (steady-state method, n = 72), then at 30 days of life (single oral load, n = 47). Urinary lactulose and mannitol were measured by HPLC. The mean lac/man urinary ratio dropped from 1.27 +/- 0.73 (day 1) to 0.34 +/- 0.36 at day 7 and to 0.22 +/- 0.21 at day 30. At 7 days BF infants showed a significantly lower lac/man urinary ratio (0.22 +/- 0.25) than the CM group (0.47 +/- 0.41). The human neonate shows a developmental pattern of sugar intestinal permeability that resembles gut closure observed in other mammals. Intestinal permeability decreases faster in breast-fed babies than in those fed with adapted or HA formulas.
authors.affiliation: Department of Pediatrics, University of Ancona, Italy.
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Catassi
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bonucci
authors.forename: G V
authors.initials: GV
authors.lastname: Coppa
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Carlucci
authors.forename: P L
authors.initials: PL
authors.lastname: Giorgi
mesh_terms: D001942:Breast Feeding; D002851:Chromatography, High Pressure Liquid; D006801:Humans; D007225:Infant Food; D007227:Infant Nutritional Physiological Phenomena; D007231:Infant, Newborn; D007422:Intestines / Q000254:growth & development / Q000502:physiology*; D007792:Lactulose / Q000652:urine; D008353:Mannitol / Q000652:urine; D010539:Permeability; D012016:Reference Values
chemical_list: D008353:Mannitol; D007792:Lactulose