Breast Milk Feeding, Brain Development, and Neurocognitive Outcomes: A 7-Year Longitudinal Study in Infants Born at Less Than 30 Weeks' Gestation

We studied 180 infants born at <30 weeks’ gestation or <1250 grams birth weight enrolled in theVictorian Infant Brain Studies cohort from 2001-2003. We calculated the number of days on which infants received>50% of enteral intake as breast milk from 0-28 days of life. Outcomes included brain volumes measuredby magnetic resonance imaging at term equivalent and 7 years of age, and cognitive (IQ, reading, mathematics,attention, working memory, language, visual perception) and motor testing at 7 years of age. We adjusted for age,sex, social risk, and neonatal illness in linear regression.