GB2320711A - An angled teat for use with a baby's feeding bottle - Google Patents

Abstract

A teat for a feeding bottle comprises a body portion 2 terminating in a nipple 4. The common longitudinal axis of symmetry 3 of the body portion 2 and nipple 4 is obliquely angled ( i.e., <90{) with respect to the base flange 1 of body portion 2 when the teat is fitted to bottle 6 using screw-on apertured top 7. The angle between the longitudinal axis of symmetry 3 and the plane of the base flange 1 is less than 80{ and more than 45{, preferably about 70{.

Description

Teat The invention relates to the separate and usually flexible mouthpiece, known as a teat, of a feeding bottle, and to a bottle fitted or supplied with such a teat.

Fig. 1 of the accompanying diagrammatic drawing is a side elevation of a known teat for a baby's feeding bottle. It comprises a base flange 1 which is attached to the mouth of a bottle by an apertured screw-on cap and a body portion 2 of which the longitudinal axis 3 of symmetry is normal to the plane of the base flange t and which terminates in an apertured nipple 4 on which the baby sucks. In an older version (not shown), the base flange is omitted and the body portion is stretched over the bottle mouth without the use of a cap.

The material of the teat is usually a rubber-like plastics.

As most parents will know, the only practical way of bottle feeding a baby if the bottle is fitted with the Fig. 1 teat or the older version is to cradle the baby in a lying-down position, which is unhealthy for the baby. Even then, the baby sucks in excessive air once the bottle is about half empty and bottle-fed babies are prone to ear infections.

The invention aims to overcome the aforementioned problem by providing a teat of which the body portion ant nipple are oblique when the teat has been fitted to the bottle, i.e.

so that the aforementioned axis of symmetry is at an angle of less than 900 to the base flange, preferably less than 800 and up to 450, ideally about 700.

An example of the invention is illustrated in Figs. 2 and 3 of the accompanying diagrammatic drawing, wherein Fig. 2 is a side elevation of the teat and Fig. 3 shows the Fig. 2 teat attached to a bottle which is being held in the correct position for feeding a baby.

The teat of the invention again comprises a base flange 1 which isattached to the bottle 6 by a screw-on top or cap 7.

The body portion 2 with nipple 4 are oblique so that the axis of symmetry 3 extends at less than 900 to the plane of the flange 1. In the illustrated embodiment, the angle x is 220 but it could be anything from 100 to 1150, preferably about 200.

Referring to Fig. 3, it will now be evident that a baby can comfortably suck on the nipple 4 while it is sitting up, which is the healthiest position for feeding. Any air entering the teat 4 rises as bubbles away from the baby's mouth towards the bottle base, even when very little liquid is left in the bottle and without the need for lying the baby down or holding the bottle vertically upside down.

Claims (5)

Claims

1. A teat for a feeding bottle, comprising an apertured nipple on the end of a body portion for direct attachment to the mouth of the bottle or by way of a base flange on the body portion, wherein the body portion and nipple have a common longitudinal axis of symmetry which is oblique when the teat has been fitted to the bottle.

2. A teat according to Claim 1 having a base flange at the end of the body portion remote from the nipple, wherein the said axis of symmetry is at an angle of less than 80 and more than 450 to the plane of the base flange.

3. A teat according to Claim 1 or Claim 2, wherein the said axis of symmetry is at about 70 to the plane of the base flange.

4. A feeding bottle fitted or supplied with a teat according to any preceding claim.

5. A teat for a feeding bottle, substantially as hereinbefore described with reference to Figs. 2 and 3 of the accompanying drawings.