Meta-analysis of the effect of breastfeeding on pain relief caused by heel blood sampling in full term newborns

Objective To evaluate the effect of breast milk sucking on pain relief caused by heel blood sampling in full-term newborns based on meta-analysis.

Methods Randomized controlled trials on the effect of breast milk sucking on pain relief caused by heel blood sampling in full-term newborns were searched from the PubMed, EMbase, Cochrane Library, China Biology Medicine disc, CNKI, Wanfang Database and VIP database. Time of retrieval was from its inception to September 2022. RevMan 5.4 software was used for meta-analysis.

Results 10 articles were finally involved in meta-analysis. Compared with newborns who didn't such breast milk, those who did it showed different results in terms of neonatal pain scale (WMD = - 2.21, 95% CI: - 2.34 - - 2.07), heart rate (WMD = - 11.80, 95% CI: - 16.82 - - 6.78), and time of crying (WMD = - 39.34, 95% CI: - 47.21 - - 31.47), the differences were statistically significant (all P < 0.05).

Conclusion Breast milk sucking can relieve the pain of neonatal heel blood sampling, shorten the time of crying and reduce their heart rates. However, due to the limitation of the study methods, quantity and quality of study, more high-quality and large-scale studies are still needed for further verification.