NUK First Choice bottle > Reviews (2)

When it came to moving my little girl from the breast to a bottle she was quite fussy, when I say quite I mean very fussy and would not drink from the conventional bottle and nipples such as the Avent bottles and teats. This lead me to various searches around Boots and we finally settled upon the Nuk range. She now loves these bottles and will not drink from anything else.

So, what is so special about the Nuk range? Well, they offer a unique orthodontic shape which replicates breast feeding as closely as possible as they actually took a mothers breast as their model when designing the shape. According to their website, "The unique NUK orthodontic shape was developed over 50 years ago after intensive research by two German orthodontists, Professor Dr. W Balters and Dr. med. dent. A Muller. Their research found that prolonged use of conventional round teats and soothers could cause oral abnormalities like open bite. They therefore decided to develop a teat that is based on the shape of a mother's nipple during breast-feeding. By closely mimicking the sucking action of breast-feeding, NUK teats and soothers encourage the correct oral development for your baby."

The teat is flat on one side and more rounded on the other side and I think it actually really does look like a proper nipple, if only a little big (I'm only comparing this to my nipples, I can't speak for all other women out there, perhaps their nipples are bigger but who knows!!) I find that this teat really fits into my little girls mouth well. Other teats seem to just stick there and be quite plasticky, not realistic at all but the fact that this teat is squishy and quite moveable really works well for her when she is sucking. They are made from latex instead of plastic so I think this is why they work well also. They are a yellow colour rather than clear plastic so look different from the regular teat as well. Whenever my little girl uses the bottle we always get asked about them and I always give people a good review

I find that they really have done their homework on this teat. I was quite interested to learn about all the functions of the mouth and how much feeding impacts on their whole mouth system for the rest of their life. If you don't want them to suffer from problems later, ie problems with teeth and speech then proper bottle and teat selection is vitally important. The flat bit on the teat that fits so well in my little girls mouth apparently ensures correct positioning of the tongue which encourages the milking action that helps widen the jaw and allows for correct spacing for tooth development. All the teats also have air vents which help prevent colic, another awesome plus of these teats I think as I have heard colic is not nice. My little girl never got it and maybe these teats had a lot to do with that fact.

The teat also has an upwards facing feed hole which helps the milk to mix with saliva and aids good digestion. These are things I never really thought about before picking a teat so I'm glad the good folks at Nuk did.

There are two different Nuk teats available. Stage 1 is for babies 0-6 months and stage 2 is 6-18 months. If you buy a Nuk bottle which is about £5 from Boots it will come with just the one teat but you can buy packs of replacement teats. They sell them with two in a pack for approximately £5.50 which I don't think is too bad.

The bottles are great because they also come in what I call a smaller size. I like to buy the bottles that hold 5fl oz as sometimes this is all my little girl will drink in a sitting and then don't have to throw away any un-used milk. I am also quite excited as I looked on their website today and they now have bottles with Disney characters on them!!

NUK bottles are very well regarded in their industry too. Apparently they are used in many maternity and neonatal wards throughout the UK. In fact, NUK is currently used in over 200 hospitals, including Great Ormond Street, Alder Hey and Birmingham Children's Hospital. The NUK orthodontic teat is recommended by 93% of paediatricians and 87% of midwives2 and is the only teat approved by the British Dental Health Foundation.