Immediately after your baby is born, medical personnel follow a checklist of assessments to ensure your baby is healthy and ready to thrive. From cutting the umbilical cord to applying eye ointment, to placing ID bands and taking their footprint, your baby is the center of attention. Your baby’s medical team will also recommend a vital step: giving your baby an injection of Vitamin K.

What is Vitamin K and what does it do in the body?
Vitamin K is a fat-soluble vitamin that the body needs to help our blood to clot.

Why do babies need a Vitamin K injection?
Babies are born without Vitamin K in their bodies. This means that their blood cannot clot. Because babies cannot get Vitamin K by eating leafy green vegetables like adults, they need the injection for protection against bleeding.

What could happen if my baby does NOT get a Vitamin K injection?
A baby without a Vitamin K injection can start to bleed suddenly, without any warning. This is known as Vitamin K deficiency bleeding (VKDB). This dangerous and potentially fatal condition may develop without parents even knowing it until it is too late, because symptoms of a brain bleed are subtle (babies may be fussy, lethargic or have trouble feeding).

For babies that get the Vitamin K shot a birth, the chance of developing VKDB is relatively nonexistent. Without the Vitamin K shot, the risk of VKDB is 81 times greater.

Doesn’t breastmilk have Vitamin K? What about formula?
Unfortunately, breastmilk and formula don’t have enough Vitamin K to prevent VKDB.

What are the current recommendations for giving Vitamin K?
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends a Vitamin K injection should be given to all newborns as a single, intramuscular dose of 0.5 to 1 mg.

Are there any side effects of the Vitamin K injection?
Like any injection, there may be minimal bleeding, redness, bruising and irritation at the injection site.

Is there an oral Vitamin K supplement available for babies?
While you can find oral vitamin K for purchase, it is not nearly as effective as the injection and is not approved by the FDA.

Urban legends
The Vitamin K injection does not cause autism or leukemia. For more fact-based information about the Vitamin K injection, please visit the Evidence Based Birth website.