The CUPDAY Study: prebiotic-probiotic milk product in 1-3-year-old children attending childcare centres

Aim: The aim of the study was to evaluate the efficacy of a milk product containing probiotics and prebiotics (CUPDAY Milk) on the incidence of diarrhoea in children attending daycare centres. Methods: The study was undertaken in a randomized controlled trial with 496 children aged 1-3 years attending 29 childcare centres in Perth, Australia. The endpoint for the study was the number of days in which children were recorded as having four or more stools. The diarrhoeal rates were analyzed by Poisson regression using 'intention to treat' (all children) and 'reduced' (children enrolled for more than 10 days) data sets. Results: There was no difference in demographic characteristics between the case and control groups. In the 'intention to treat' analysis, a total of 41 745 child-days were included in the study. The adjusted risk ratio for those consuming the 'Cupday' milk drink was 0.82 (95% CI 0.73-0.94) for the intention to treat sample (n = 496) and 0.80 (95% CI 0.70-0.91) for the reduced sample (n = 315). The children consuming the 'Cupday' drink had a 20% reduction in the number of days experiencing four or more stools per day. Conclusion: A milk containing probiotics and prebiotics reduced the number of days children attending child care who had four or more stools by 20%.