Real support for breast feeding.

[Blu]

A friend of mine has just returned from a holiday with friends in Norway. She said one of the women had had a baby the previous day, was back home, and having terrible problems with the baby latching on - sore painful nipples etc.

She called the hospital and within an hour, a professional b/f support mw had arrived at her home to help her, and the problem was sorted instantly!

also at Dorchester

what, they come to your house? immediately?
The provinces, here I come! (except I'm not planning another baby...oh no...)

Also my experience in NZ

not immediately

but they book someone in

also they don't let you leave hospital with first baby until you are confident with breastfeeding

When I called my hospital breastfeeding counsellor in desparation, she came out on her day off (complete with her 4 year old in tow, because she came out too quickly to organise childcare) to see me, because I'd seen her at the hospital and she knew how keen I was to breastfeed. That's what you call support.

But how do they ensure you have established bf Enid? In both my times in hospital (2 different hospitals) the policy was that you should have established bf before you left, but as there was literally nobody on that ward who knew enough about how to support a mother to bf, this was all theory rather than practice.

When I wrote to the head of midwifery services saying that they ought to have a bf counsellor on the ward every day to ensure that mothers could established bf, the response came back that if this happened, midwives would be de-skilled.

I can understand their concern about that, but as the mw's aren't skilled in the first place, I really wonder how they can be "de-skilled". And in effect what they meant, was that it was more acceptable for them to not take real measures to ensure mothers were supported to bf, than it was to acknowledge that their mw's were ineffective in supporting breastfeeding.

She sounds fab wwb. My community mw was like that.

Sorry - I have obvioulsy been experiencing life in the dark ages. There was a b/f counsellor at in our NHS trust, and an extremely good one - but only available on certain days of the week, make appointment, struggle in with newborn, etc etc.
V pleased to hear all this.
Shouldn't be a postcode lottery, should it?

(she went and borrowed a breast pump from one of her other mothers to see if it would work on me, so that I didn't waste £25 buying the wrong model - what a woman!)

Caligula,sounds like something in Stalin's USSR.
In North West Wales,I had a m/w come to my house (straight from her bed) when I phoned for help (we are given the ambulance control number to call anytime)at about 7:00 am on a Sunday morning.
Hows that for service?!