What happens just a few minutes after birth might affect a child’s health for years to come.
A new study published Tuesday in JAMA Pediatrics suggests that newborns whose umbilical cords were cut more than three minutes after birth may develop better social and fine motor skills than babies whose cords were cut within 10 seconds.
Dr. Heike Rabe, a neonatologist at the U.K.’s Brighton & Sussex Medical School who worked on the study, says that the findings should influence the discussions soon-to-be moms have with their doctors before giving birth.
“Expectant women might want to discuss the option of waiting before the cord is clamped when their baby is born,” she tells PEOPLE.
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The extra time between birth and clamping the cord allows more blood to flow from the placenta to the baby, in turn increasing iron levels, critical for neural development.
“The extra blood at birth helps the baby to cope better with the transition from life in the womb, where everything is provided for them by the placenta and the mother, to the outside world,” Rabe wrote in the editorial accompanying the study. “Their lungs get more blood so that the exchange of oxygen into the blood can take place smoothly.”
As for when exactly the cord should be clamped and the extents of the benefits, there are lingering questions.
“We still do not know what would be the optimal time of waiting before clamping the cord,” Rabe tells PEOPLE, though the study, conducted on 263 healthy Swedish newborns, found that waiting three minutes to cut provided health benefits in study participants four years down the line.
— Maria Yagoda
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