When a pacifier falls from a baby's mouth and hits the ground, parents have different ways of tending to it. Some parents throw it out right away, while others boil it or rinse it.
Other moms pick it up, put it in their mouth and hand it back to their baby, and according to ABC News, a recent study suggests this method may reduce the chance of the child developing allergies later on.
Researchers at the Sahlgrenska Academy of Göteborg University in Sweden spent several years following 174 parents and their babies while testing them for allergies, eczema and asthma, as well as documenting how often parents cleaned off their baby's pacifiers. They found that by the time babies were 18 months old, those whose parents had used their own mouths on their baby's pacifers were less likely to develop asthma and eczema later on.
According to Dr. Samuel Friendlander, an allergy specialist at University Hospitals in Cleveland, "the immune system is like an army, and if the army doesn't have anything to fight - like germs - it fights allergens."
Results of the Göteborg University study seemed to follow this idea, as the Swedish researchers concluded that parents who exposed their babies to bacteria through their saliva were stimulating their baby's immune systems.
There are many other ways for children to be exposed to bacteria, and it exposure to germs may possibly be detrimental to their health as well. Parents may, for instance, unknowingly pass on a virus to their children through shared saliva.
Long-term effects of bacteria exposure are not clear, according to Dr. Erick Forno, a pediatrician at the Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center, who advised parents against sucking their baby's pacifiers more often.
According to Dr. Jennifer Kim, a pediatric immunologist and allergist at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York, parents should remember that findings from one study should not alter their parenting methods and behavior.
