Doctors are concerned that parents are buying melatonin supplements from overseas online retailers without a prescription.
Lack of sleep can be devastating for children and their parents, especially if it becomes an ongoing problem.These supplements can be easily bought online, including in fruit-flavoured gummy formulations for children, and experts say they are being
However, pharmacists are allowed to sell certain melatonin products to people over 18 with jet lag and people over 55 with insomnia without the need for a prescription. "Even though there's not a huge amount of data, we know it's been so widely used that if there were significant problems we would know about it."Many parents suffer silently through sleep deprivation, sometimes with devastating outcomes. Why is there so much conflicting information on baby sleep, and how can we support families to thrive?Dr Best says there is strong evidence to support the use of melatonin supplements for children with autism and ADHD.
" on typically developing children so that we can actually say to parents, doctors and health professionals, 'We haven't got a great deal of data, but we've got something,'" she says.One issue with buying melatonin online, Dr Best says, is that the formulations can be unreliable; you can't be confident how much melatonin is in the tablet or gummy and sometimes it might not be present at all.
"If they're prepared in gummy form, if the child happens to get their hand in the jar, they could be consuming an awful lot of melatonin," Dr Best says.If you are concerned your child has taken too much melatonin, contact a doctor immediately or call the Poisons Information Centre on 13 11 26.Professor Blunden says it's important for parents to understand that "more does not mean better" when it comes to using melatonin supplements.
"It's a hormone and it has a very strong relationship to serotonin, which is one of our mood hormones."Unlike some other medications used to aid sleep, Dr Best says people are unlikely to become dependent on melatonin supplements or experience withdrawals when they stop.Loved ones, mothers' groups, and TikTok feeds are full of suggestions about how to get bubs and kids sleeping better and for longer. One tip doing the rounds is magnesium spray.
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