EXPRESS Study Results: New evidence on the impact of audio relaxation on expressed breastmilk for mothers of very preterm babies

Published on Monday, 11 November 2024

The results of the EXPRESS study have now been published.

Why we did the study?

An estimated 2.4 million babies globally are born very preterm (28 to 32 weeks' gestation) or extremely preterm (less than 28 weeks' gestation). Babies who are born very early (at less than seven months of pregnancy) can't drink milk directly from the breast or a bottle.

Because breast milk is better for babies born very early, we did a research study to see whether listening to a relaxing recording increased the amount of milk people could express, and/ or made them less anxious and distressed. Relaxation could potentially improve breast milk expressed by optimising hormone levels and reducing stress.

What we did?

132 people across three NHS trusts took part in the study. We gave half the people a relaxing recording, which we asked them to listen to, whilst they were expressing milk. The other half didn't have a recording. We then collected information on how much milk they expressed.

The recording included breathing exercises, muscle, relaxation, and visualisation of milk flow and infant skin-to-skin contact.

Did the relaxing recording help people make more milk?

People who had the relaxing recording made a little bit more milk (about 75ml more each day) but this might have been down to chance. The study was not large enough to be sure if a difference of this size was because of chance or because of the recording.

Other trials have looked at breastmilk and relaxation. When all the results are looked at together, they suggest that relaxation is likely to help people make more milk (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/38709505/). The participants of the EXPRESS study had given birth much earlier than women in other studies. This might mean that relaxation has less effect on breastmilk when babies are born very early.

Whilst the study did not show evidence of an improvement in levels of breast milk, participants predominantly enjoyed the recording and found it relaxing.

There was no difference in how many babies were getting breastmilk later on between people with and without the recording.

You can read the full paper here:

Lactation-focused audio relaxation versus standard care for mothers of very preterm infants (the EXPRESS randomised clinical trial) | Pediatric Research