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The Nithsdale Schizophrenia Surveys 16. Breast-feeding and schizophrenia: Preliminary results and hypotheses

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  03 January 2018

Robin G. McCreadie
Robin G. McCreadie*
Affiliation:
Crichton Royal Hospital, Dumfries, Scotland
*
Dr R. G. McCreadie, Department of Clinical Research, Crichton Royal Hospital, Bankend Road, Dumfries DGI 4TG, Scotland
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Abstract

Background

Schizophrenia may in some cases be a neurodevelopmental disorder. Breast milk is important to the developing brain. Might a lack of breast milk be an environmental risk factor in schizophrenia?

Method

Mothers of 45 schizophrenic patients in Nithsdale, southwest Scotland, completed a questionnaire about whether or not their offspring had been breast-fed.

Results

The incidence of breast-feeding in patients was 29% and in sibs 38%. Most patients were born in the 1940s and 1950s. The incidence in patients born in these two decades, 33 and 26%, respectively, was significantly lower than in Scottish surveys in 1946 (81%) and 1958 (51%). Those patients who had not been breast-fed had more schizoid and schizotypal personality traits in childhood and a poorer social adjustment than their sibs; breast-fed patients did not differ from their sibs.

Conclusions

Fewer schizophrenic patients than normal were breast-fed. Lack of breast milk may be a risk factor in the neurodevelopmental form of schizophrenia.

Type
Papers
Information
The British Journal of Psychiatry , Volume 170 , Issue 4 , April 1997 , pp. 334 - 337
Copyright
Copyright © 1997 The Royal College of Psychiatrists 

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