Outcomes Associated With Type of Milk Supplementation Among Late Preterm Infants.

The study was retrospective and used clinical records, so missing or inaccurate documentation may have affected the results. Small numbers in the human milk groups limited precision, especially when pasteurized donor human milk and expressed maternal milk were analyzed separately. Reasons for supplementation were not always recorded, so maternal request and physician orders may be underestimated. Gestational age was first taken from maternal admission records and later confirmed from newborn assessments. Important factors such as previous breastfeeding experience or prior preterm birth were not available for analysis. Maternal smoking was likely incompletely recorded, which may have affected adjustment for smoking. The sample came from a tertiary hospital and was mainly low income, multiparous, and obese mothers, so results may not apply to other late preterm populations. Because this was a chart review, it cannot prove that milk type caused the observed differences.

Do not conclude that formula supplementation caused longer stays. This was a retrospective chart review with small human milk groups and incomplete documentation of supplementation reasons, so it shows associations, not cause.