Colic Medications and Babies: A Poor Combination

Several colic medications have been tried throughout the years, with varying degrees of success. However, recent studies out of the Southwest SIDS ( Sudden Infant Death Syndrome) Research Institute in Lake Jackson, Texas, and Children’s Hospital in Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia, have found that colic medications may prove dangerous and even fatal.

The Texas researchers studied eight infants who were experiencing life- threatening respiratory and gastrointestinal symptoms. All of the babies had previously been given a premixed colic medication containing Dramamine, a popular antihistamine used to relieve motion sickness, and Donnatal, a drug prescribed for irritable bowel syndrome and other intestinal disorders. Donnatal contains, among other things, phenobarbital, a barbiturate used as a sedative. In an article published in the journal Clinical Pediatrics, the researchers wrote that the possibility that the drug can lead to respiratory and gastrointestinal problems in certain infants “requires serious consideration and further evaluation.”