[Claire and Boys]

Talking to some friends online the other day. One of them just had a preemie baby girl and one of the others asked her "Can you breastfeed her, or does she need to have a special nutrition formula?"

The thing is, this lady is a NURSE...you'd think she'd know that breastmilk was the best thing for babies esp. preemies because of the immune benefits.

The mum in question put her straight though, she is not only pumping for the baby at the moment (and hoping to get her on the breast once she is able and has adequate suck reflex etc) but she is also going to tandem nursing with her other child (she has a son only 7 months older....bfing didn't work for birth control with her lol) She had to wean him because of premature labour a couple of months ago but now he is right back on the breast again!

 

[mamasophy]

A friend of mine had 28 week preemie twins. She nursed, supplemented with donated bm, and solely pumped for one (1 of the twins would never latch - turned out she had CP), but she had to add "human milk fortifier" to the bottles of bm. Maybe that's the "special formula"?

 

[MidwifeErika]

I bet she meant the higher calorie formula or fortifier. My oldest was a preemie and we had to mix that with her breastmilk for a few months so that she would take in as many calories as just waking up to eat was expending.

 

[Claire and Boys]

Yeah, I'd heard of the fortifier as well. That wasn't how it was worded though...it was "can she have breastmilk, or does she NEED formula" As if she thinks formula is somehow superior nutrition wise to a preemie than breastmilk I thought that was a bit different to adding a supplement to the breastmilk..

 

[lesley&grace]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Claire and Boys The thing is, this lady is a NURSE...you'd think she'd know that breastmilk was the best thing for babies esp. preemies because of the immune benefits.

Not necessarily. My husband just became a nurse, and while breastfeeding is a course you can take, it's not mandatory (my dh took it though, when I was about to pop with dd actually. It was an online course, and I sat in to a lot of sessions. We both learned a lot). Precious little time is devoted to breastfeeding, even for Pediatricians. And here, Public Health Nurses are a main resource to new moms and barely a handful are also trained as Lactation consultants. Sad, isn't it?

I was very pleased to hear your friend set her straight. Good for her!

 

[Claire and Boys]

I think it's very sad, yeah... I am actually a trained nursery nurse, although I didn't follow it as a career path, and the 2 years of intensive training did not involve a single word about breastfeeding, which I think is disgusting with hindsight (I was very young and did not think to question it)
They taught us how to mix bottles, that was it!

Personally I think anyone who is going to be working with new mothers should have to have SOME breastfeeding training.

 

[theboysmama]

the human milk fortifier is a cows milk based formula. My best friend had a preemie and has dairy allergies in her family. they added the fortifier to her bm w/out even telling her and her baby broke out in a horrible rash (that is how she knew that they were giving her the fortifier). She was pumping so she separated the hind milk and the fore milk and only gave her baby hind milk. this way her baby was getting the fattiest part of her milk and wasn't getting formula. Our bodies are amazing!