Is there any difference between Nursery/Infant Water and the usual bottled purified water?

[augustine18]

FTM here with a 32w6d premature baby who is now almost 5 months old (happy & healthy). She’s currently mix-fed and for her formula, we mix it with infant water (either Nursery Water or Gerber brand, both w/o fluoride).

My question is: Is there really any difference with these waters marketed for infants versus the usual bottled purified water? We adults drink the purified water and was wondering if the baby can use it as well. Aside from it being cheaper, it’s also easier for us to just buy 1 kind.

P.S. I’ve read from previous posts that you can just use filtered and/or boiled tap water… but we don’t really trust our tap water that’s why we drink bottled purified water.

 

[cheriblsm]

@augustine18 Unless your pediatrician told you to use special water, you should be fine with whatever you guys are drinking.

Also common misunderstanding, usually you're not heating water to make the water safe, but heating formula to kill bacteria in the formula. This is especially important for a premie. I see a lot of people boiling a large batch of water then letting it cool to use that, but that's really not the "goal" of heating the formula. Just fyi. Also she's pretty much at the age where you worry less about Cronobacter so you're likely good to go with your drinking water

 

[jinc1019]

@cheriblsm While your advice is good, the general recommendation is boiling and cooling the water before preparing formula for sterilizing the tap/bottle water to kill of any harmful bugs or viruses that might have gotten in the water.

The advice to use 70c water to sterilize the formula powder as well has only been recommended for premie and low weight babies in Canada. The reason they say cooled water is that a lot of formulas have fortifiers and other add ins that are heat sensitive and using water that's too hot (70C) will damage the nutritional content, however preemies have a weakened immune system so the benefits outweigh the risks for them. My hospital advice was go rtf for a few months then powder to avoid this scenario.

Edit I boil also cuz I grew up in another country where tap waters reliability was never the best and we were told to always boil filter water before drinking to avoid getting sick, so some habits and what ifs stayed with me. If your tap/bottle water is safe then that should be just fine but I boil for peace of mind

 

[augustine18]

@jinc1019 Thank you for the recommendations!

 

[augustine18]

@cheriblsm Thank you so much for your input! Much appreciated.

 

[emmarona]

@augustine18 Just use your purified water that you drink. I used distilled water for a few months but we just use our tap water now.

 

[katrina2017]

@augustine18 Nursery water is distilled water. Always get fluoride free.