was shocked by the amount of bottle-feeders in hospital

[misdee]

found it quite upsetting at times. my bed was by the empties 'bottle bank', so saw how many people on the ward were bottle feeding. in the 4 days i was there, there were 10 women on the ward in total, and only myself and another lady was breastfeeding. The midwives offered help to everyone, but most decided on bottles.

the reason i found it upsetting was because i didnt want dd3 to have formula but that choice was basically taken away from me whilst she was SCBU and was given formula by tube.

oh hi moondog, how are you?

I'm very well thank you, and you lucykatie?
Hope your dd settled back to sleep and let you watch DH in peace!

YEAH SHE HAS GONE BACK OFF BUT ONLY AFTER ANOTHER FEED, SORRY IN CAPS, there sorted.

do not watch dh...do i need to?

Oh sorry, thought you said you wanted some peace to watch it. I dunno actually because I don't watch tv at all, but I know that some of the gals on MN are mad for it!! (Very good apparently.)

Hiya i dont want to start anything up again but i read further down that some of you dont think they should provide free formula in hospitals. Can I just say although i did bf my daughter Eve for the first 4 months of her life that in hosp i had a traumatic labour lost loads of blood and my colostrum didnt come through for 3 days so if they hadnt given Eve a cup of formula she would have been starving!

I agree with the last post, i was advised by the hospital to try mixed feeding as i didn't have the amount of milk to satisy my nearly 10 pound baby staight away. Also it took me nearly 3 months to master breastfeeding, so I mixed fed till then. I wouldn't change what i did and the formula helped when i developed cracked nipples and masitis after 3 weeks. These things take time and paractice and why should your baby have to suffer while you both get the hang on things!

Jen
xxx

Although I feel that people who wish to feed artificially from birth should bring their own formula to hospital with them,there are of course exceptions to every rule, and I don't think for a minute edodgy, that anyone would expect your baby to go without.
I wonder how you would have felt if you had been offered donated breastmilk?

Really interested in these instances of milk taking a long time to 'come in'. I know a fair bit about b/feeding but not much about this phenomenen. Wonder what a b/f counsellor would say about this situation/belief?

(This thread is taking an AGE to download!!)

i've read about donated breastmilk, but in my sleepy state i didnt think to ask if the hospital had a milk bank. wish i had asked now as would rather dd3 had any sort of breastmilk rather than formula.

Yipes! I don't think anyone would advocate a starving baby being left without anything to eat because his mum hadn't brought in any formula!!

In some hospitals, yes, even in the UK, babies whose need for breastmilk has outpaced their mum's supply, would be offered milk from the human milk bank. Usually, where there is a milk bank, the milk is used for very sick or pre-term babies in the SCBU or NICU, but I do occasionally hear of other babies getting it.

It does smetimes happen that a traumatic birth or post-birth seems to delay the milk coming in, especially if the mother has not been able to put the baby to the breast, or offer skin to skin, very often in the first days. Ideally, if a mother has not managed this in the first day, she should be helped to hand express colostrum and this should be done, and given to the baby as regularly as he would have it if he was feeding.

There are also instances when milk is just 'late' and we don't know why. These babies only need formula if there is no milk bank and/or if the mothers have not been helped to express.

moondog - i would have been delighted to have donated BM for DS -my milk was late coming in (ventouse delivery, distressed baby) - not a dreadful labour experience, but below average.

can milk coming in late be related to stress? i was stressed by bladder problems (urinary retention/catheter) the first few days after birth so wonder if that could have anything do with it?

Hiya i do agree donated breast milk should be an option but personally i felt inadequate enough at the time for not producing my own breast milk straight away (preg hormones made me over emotional lol) that i think this would have made me feel even worse.

To return to earlier posts ? what I am really interested in is how Sweden got to its position. How did they change people?s minds about trying? I wonder also how many people genuinely don?t want to try or if they are just in that uncertain grey area where you can?t think clearly after birth. Would they be more interested in it if they had more info and preparation beforehand and also more encouragement and support straight after birth?

It?s a difficult position for health professionals as you don?t want to push people or interfere with their rights but you can?t have it both ways it seems without upsetting someone. Either you are too ?offhand? and don?t provide enough for those who do want to or you are too pushy and dictatorial for those who don?t want to or are uncertain. In a sense you really need to have a successful breastfeeding culture to sway the uncertain ones but that is the irony ? you can?t put the cart before the horse.

For me I would have definitely benefited from more info on the potential difficulties and how to deal with them, but that is me. However you can just imagine someone reading a brochure and thinking ?god that sounds bloody awful ? I don?t think I?ll bother with that? So it?s hard to know where to pitch promotional literature. I don?t think women do react to the lovey-dovey pictures though ? they respond to other women and how they have coped. Hard when you don?t see them ( I didn?t see any as I worked till I had ds and didn?t know anyone else who had a baby). More classes perhaps may help with real people talking about their experiences. I did actually volunteer to go along to a support group for pregnant women. The health visitor seemed pleased but a little bemused and didn?t really ?use? me properly spending more time pretending to breastfeed a doll and I only went the once. My dd was a bit old by then really but I am sure more women would be happy to give up an hour or two to show others what to do ? and also incidentally I would also would be happy to donate to a milk bank.

Do they screen the mothers who donate breast milk. When people get pregnant they don't have to have a HIV test, but they say that a mother can pass the virus to the baby through breast milk.

So my question is do they screen the women who donate the milk? Does anyone know?

i belive they either screen/steralise the milk. i read an article about it a short while agop and its rather strict process of donating, similar to that of donating blood.

Do they screen the milk or the womens blood as well

heres an article about human milk donation

very informative.

Yes they do.

The milk is also heat treated.

I donated milk to a hospital in Glasgow who were desparate for donors. The milk of donors is pooled together and given to babies in the neonatal unit. Very premature babies do better on breastmilk and donated milk is given when mums cannot keep up with demand. In total I donated 2 gallons of breastmilk.

What are the guidelines for donating?

Donors have to be screened for HIV, hepatitis B and C, syphilis and a rare condition called HTLV.

Donations must stop if the woman develops mastitis or rubella or recently had a rubella vaccination.

Donors can take the progesterone only contraceptive pill and use asthma inhalers, if necessary, but cannot take any other medication, smoke, or drink more than two units of alcohol or seven cups of coffee a day.

The first donation must be within six months of starting breastfeeding.

My own hospital does not have a milk bank but 100% mums with preterm babies agree to express milk for them even when they do not intend to actually breastfeed.

Got it from this link

www.babyworld.co.uk/information/newparents/donatingmilk.htm

Eulalia..such a lucid post.
Really hard isn't it. The bottlefeeders feel b/feeding is rammed down their throat, the breastfeeders feel their isn't enough information.
I think any 'authority' (ie health trust,school,whatever) has a duty to promote best practice. B/feeding is undoubtedly best (other factors such as emotional state, personal circumstances notwithstanding) which is why I think that artificial feeds should not be provided by a hospital. Yes, of course people should be free to use them but the onus is on them. I am trying to think of an appropriate analogy.School vending machines?? Shouldn't they be primed to only provide 'good' food. Yes, let people bring in what they like but don't they have an obligation to aim for a desirable model?

In my area, 'real life' b/feeders are used often. I took my 2 week old baby in to feed in a b/feeding w/shop when she was 2 weeks old, and have also gone into schools with her (as part of B/feeding Awareness Week) and fed her in front of about 30 11 year olds (no silly comments at all-they were intrigued!)

Yet....the very low b/feeding figures haven't really changed here since this started (Sure Start Initiative)Very perplexing...

Eulalia - the Swedish thing is the same as the Norwegian and the Danish thing.....breastfeeding never really went away. So although Scandinavian governments did take action in the 70s and 80s by doing things like banning free samples of formula and regulating promotion, they didn't have to convince anyone the bf was worth trying, as there was never a time when fewer than something like 90 plus per cent of women at least started off bf.

There was a drop after the first weeks, when people started topping up with formula or giving early solids, but the basic notion that breastfeeding was something that everyone 'just did' never disappeared. Result: when women discuss infant feeding, there is no suggestion that breastfeeding support is rammed down people's throats or that it is designed to make other women feel guilty.

Scandinavia has always had liberal maternity/paternity leave, compared to other parts of Western Europe and they have a generally more open attitude to bodies.

Things are very different here. We are (in the UK) fairly close to the US in terms of stats, embarrassment factors, training of healthcare professionals.

moondog - you breastfed in front of a class full of kids! Good for you. I couldn't do that. I am sure it must help though and there probably just needs to be moreof that kind of thing to change attitudes.

tiktok - thanks for clarifying that. Yes I visited Sweden on holiday as a teenager and was suprised at the liberal attitudes there. Ironically they have a low rate of teenage pregnancies too. Something I always point out when people say they are uncomfortable with long term b/feeding becasue they think it is sexual. As hardly anyone in this country breastfeeds long term (ie over a year or two) then it certainly isn't that that is contributing to sexual promiscuity in the UK.

I can see that not allowing formula in hospitals would be too radical here but early introduction of formula does tend to be a big factor in failure of establishing b/feeding... so what do you do... just maybe hold off with it for longer? I know that the staff at the hosptial seemed to be obsessed with ds's glucose levels and kept saying he had to be fed. However he wasn't even crying in hunger. Am I right in thinking that a newborn has enough reserves for 12 hours or so without any food? I am not suggesting starving babies of course. I didn't like the way the staff were constantly sticking pins in ds's heels to get blood to check his glucose - I am sure it was unneccesary.

Eulalia, they did this to my two too-noone suggested formula but there was a feeling of 'food needs to be got down this baby' asap!!
In my area the community m/wives do I know feel a little frustrated at the hospital ones, but I think maybe if you work in a hospital your remit is to sort stuff out short term?
My fantastic community m/wife was up and at my place very early one Sunday with 30 mins (with uncombed hair!!) when I phoned in tears.

Re the class, several parents that I knew (all bottlefeeders) told me afterwards that their kids had come home and told them all about it and really enjoyed it!

This was where the weasel milk story came in!!

Eulalia thats what hasppened with dd3. bloomin formula. as dd3 glucose levels were rising, although slowly, with me feeding her 2hourly, it wasnt quick enough for the paed. they didnt take her down when her level was 1.3, but decided that fater it had risen to 2.8, then dropped to 2.3 she needed to go and be tube fed.