Some people believe that eating placenta will beat the postpartum Depression.
This practice has assumed such proportions that woman collects placenta and sells them!
But Scientific evidence does not seem to support this.
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Although the placenta is revered in many cultures, there is scarce evidence that any customarily eat the placenta after the newborn’s birth.[4] Despite an urban legend that the Basque people ate placentas, there is no evidence that they ever did,[4] and the Euskara word for placenta, karena, is not etymologically related to their word for cannibalism, gizajana.
Those who advocate placentophagy in humans believe that eating the placenta prevents postpartum depression and other pregnancy complications.[5] Obstetrician and spokesperson for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists Maggie Blott disputes the post-natal depression theory, stating there is no medical reason to eat the placenta; “Animals eat their placenta to get nutrition – but when people are already well-nourished, there is no benefit, there is no reason to do it.”[6] On the other hand, American Medical anthropologists at the University of South Florida and UNLV, surveyed new mothers, and found that about 3/4 had positive experiences from eating their own placenta, citing “improved mood”, “increased energy”, and “improved lactation”.[7] [8]
Human placenta has also been an ingredient in some traditional Chinese medicines,[9] including using dried human placenta, known as “Ziheche” (simplified Chinese:紫河车; traditional Chinese: 紫河車; pinyin: Zǐhéchē), to treat wasting diseases, infertility, impotence and other conditions.[10]
British celebrity chef Hugh Fearnly-Whittingstall, known for his series of River Cottage programmes, notoriously cooked and ate a woman’s placenta on one of his programmes.[11]
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Placentophagy
Those brave enough to eat a placenta use a variety of methods to consume the organ. But are there any real health benefits to this gustatory practice?
Warning: An image of a human placenta and an instructional video for preparing a human placenta follows.
The placenta is a temporary protective organ that serves as a conduit between the mother and her developing young. The child is fed is through the placenta via the mother’s blood supply, as waste from the young exits to the mother for disposal. The placenta follows the newborn as it exits the mother, leaving in the moments after childbirth.
In the wild, land dwelling mammals often consume the placenta. They also lap up the amniotic fluid as it flows out of the mother. The amniotic fluid consists of proteins, urea, and assorted fats, but we have yet to see a rush of new parents to drink amniotic fluid smoothies.
Mammalian consumption of the placenta is likely performed as it removes the lingering presence of blood in order to ward off predators, with one study showing placentophagy to provide an increase in natural opioids in rats.
The precedence of placentophagy in the wild leads some soon-to-be parents to wonder if they should be eating placenta after childbirth. The practice of human placentophagy brings with it claims that the act reduces post-partum depression and imparts a further connection between the mother and child. Both of these benefits could be the psychological result of a placebo effect.
More concrete benefits have been proposed as well, with placentophagy replenishing iron, aiding in lactation, and giving the mother a rush of stress relieving hormones, likecorticotropin-releasing hormone. The amount of corticotropin-releasing hormone created by the placenta increases dramatically prior to birth, leading proponents to believe the birthed placenta still contains a high concentration of this hormone.
While the placenta itself may be of nutritional benefit, do these benefits exist in a placenta prepared for human consumption?
Cooking Up Some Placenta
A typical placenta, when disconnected from the umbilical cord, is a deep red mass roughly 8 to 10 inches long, an inch or so thick, and weighing about a pound. Imagine a piece of raw flesh about size of a nice piece of prime rib, but filled with fibrous tissue that is rather tough to chew through.
While see land dwelling mammals consume the placenta raw, humans that partake in the placenta consume it in a variety of forms – prepared as a lasagna, ground up in a smoothie, or in pill form.
Cooking the placenta in any form could degrade the proteins within, decreasing the nutritive quality of the organ by imparting heat as well combined with a natural degradation of the organ over time as it exists without a nutrient supply. Small molecule hormones are often rather small, however, and difficult to rip apart at temperatures used for food preparation. Grinding the placenta into a powder for use in pills often involves boiling and drying of the flesh as well.
For optimal benefit, eating the placenta in the hours after it passes through the mother would be necessary. However, obtaining the placenta in a timely fashion is a chore in itself, as hospitals are often reticent to release the placenta and it can be difficult to grab it in the chaos that follows birth.
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Susan Stewart collects fresh human placentas, takes them home and steams them with lemon, ginger and cayenne pepper. Once cooked, she puts the organs in a dehydrator overnight then grinds them and measures the powder out into gel capsules.
The service – the Calgary single mother makes a living at this – costs about $200.
Within a day, she presents new moms with their placentas in pill form – an average human placenta yields about 150 capsules – with promises of renewed energy, better lactation and no post-partum depression. They keep indefinitely.
Placenta-eating has gained some cachet among the natural-birth set, including Mad Men’s January Jones. Ms. Stewart said she became interested in it in 2009, after she was knocked down by depression following the birth of her first child, and she could see little downside from trying it.
Resource:
http://www.reddit.com/tb/1c7rju
http://io9.com/5960569/the-questionable-nutritional-value-of-eating-a-human-placenta
Related:
Breastfeeding Protects Babies
1. Early breast milk is liquid gold.
Known as liquid gold, colostrum (coh-LOSStrum) is the thick yellow first breast milk that you make during pregnancy and just after birth.
This milk is very rich in nutrients and antibodies to protect your baby.
Although your baby only gets a small amount of colostrum at each feeding, it matches the amount his or her tiny stomach can hold.
2. Your breast milk changes as your baby grows. Colostrum changes into what is called mature milk.
By the third to fifth day after birth, this mature breast milk has just the right amount of fat, sugar, water, and protein to help your baby continue to grow.
http://ramanisblog.in/2012/08/02/breast-feeding-details-advantages-mother-child/
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