As a pediatrician in a Utah hospital, I have seen an increasing number of parents refusing their newborns’ recommended vitamin K shots. Parents who refuse the shots do so without understanding why it is recommended and worry that they may unknowingly cause unnecessary harm to their newborns.
Below are 10 important facts that all expectant parents should know before considering opting out of this vital supplement.
- Newborns are born with very little vitamin K stored in their bodies.
- Vitamin K is needed in the body to form blood clots and stop bleeding.
- One in 60 newborns who do not receive a vitamin K injection at birth will experience bleeding due to vitamin K deficiency.
- Bleeding from vitamin K deficiency can be visible (such as persistent bleeding after circumcision) or hidden (such as intestinal or cerebral bleeding).
- Bleeding can occur any time from birth until the baby is six months old. Delayed bleeding (after three weeks of age) is less common but more serious.
- Half of infants who develop delayed bleeding will develop a brain hemorrhage without warning, and of those, one in five will die. Infants who survive often suffer brain damage that can cause lifelong problems with basic tasks such as walking, eating and learning.
- Newborns who do not receive a vitamin K injection at birth are 81 times more likely to experience severe bleeding than those who do not.
- No other method of vitamin K supplementation is as effective as vitamin K injections at birth. This includes prenatal and postnatal supplementation, oral vitamin K, and infant formula supplementation.
- There is no evidence that Vitamin K injections harm babies. Vitamin K is not a vaccine and has been proven safe and effective for over 60 years.
- Common reasons parents refuse to give their infants Vitamin K injections include 1) avoiding the pain of the injection, 2) a desire to be “natural,” and 3) using alternative methods to supplement Vitamin K.
Newborn refusal of vitamin K injections is becoming increasingly common, and the rate is much higher for babies born outside of hospitals: While the refusal rate for vitamin K injections in hospitals is around 3%, recent studies have shown that babies born at home are five times less likely to receive the shot (with a refusal rate of around 15%), and babies born in birth centers are a whopping ten times less likely (with a refusal rate of around 31%).
To put these numbers in perspective, with 45,774 live births in Utah in 2022, Utah babies are more than twice as likely to be born outside of a hospital as the national average (4.4% vs. 2.1%). Assuming a birth center to home birth ratio of 1:3 (following the national average), the following numbers of babies would miss their vitamin K shot in the following situations:
- Infants born in hospitals: 1,313 (95.60% of all births in Utah, 3% rejected)
- Infants born at home: 201 (2.93% of Utah’s total births, 15% rejected)
- Infants born in birth centers: 208 (1.47% of Utah’s total births, 31% rejected)
These figures suggest that 3.76 percent of infants in Utah (1,722 infants) did not receive a vitamin K injection last year, meaning that approximately 30 infants per year in the state could experience unnecessary vitamin K deficiency bleeding.
Before refusing vitamin K injections to their newborns, parents should understand the facts about vitamin K injections and realize they are putting their infants at unnecessary risk. Vitamin K is safe. It works. It saves infants’ lives every year.
Parents with questions or concerns about vitamin K injections should seek answers from trusted, evidence-based sources, such as their doctor or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention website. Other sources, especially social media, are rife with misinformation and may spread harmful misconceptions.
Let’s work together to protect Utah’s infants by reducing unnecessary bleeding due to Vitamin K deficiency through proper education and lowering Vitamin K injection refusal rates.
Dr. Nathan Money is an assistant professor of pediatrics at the University of Utah School of Medicine and a fellowship-trained pediatrician at Primary Children’s Hospital.
