A hand to hold

Dr Bandita Sinha, Gynaecologist and Obstetrician, Fortis Hiranandani Hospital, Vashi, elaborates on the importance of breastfeeding and says that women are more likely to achieve their breastfeeding goals if they are supported appropriately and adequately

We all know that breastfeeding is the best gift that the mother can give to her baby. But, despite being one of the most natural processes, it can be riddled with difficulties and challenges – some avoidable and some not so. Women are significantly more likely to achieve their breastfeeding goals if they are supported prenatally, in the maternity care facility and after discharge.

Health promotion and disease prevention are effective methods to reduce the incidence of acute and chronic illnesses in the childhood itself. In order to increase immunity and enhance the nutritional value, breastfeeding has been identified as the cost-effective means of disease prevention with the accompanying reduction in healthcare spending. Informed women are initiating breastfeeding at an increasing rate. However, many new-age mothers struggle to maintain breastfeeding for as long as it is medically indicated and thus fail to feed the baby appropriately. Consequently, healthcare spending increases on treating diseases and conditions that could have been effectively prevented by breastfeeding.

In order to appropriately address this preventive healthcare gap and the excessive costs that results due to it, consumers, healthcare providers, insurers and employers need to be able to identify and access qualified lactation consultants to provide services and protect quality of care.

When women have trouble breastfeeding, they are often have to giveup and go for the bottle-and-formula route. In earlier days, a woman’s breastfeeding problems were left to the family physician. A new mother can be hormonally liable, recovering from surgery or birth, suffering from fatigue and learning how to fit a baby into their lives. Difficult breastfeeding is gruelling, and if support is not initiated immediately, the breastfeeding relationship can be lost within a matter of days or sometimes even hours, affecting the mother, child and family’s future for the rest of their lives. Changing times show that hospitals offering help through well-meaning lactation consultants urging the new-age mothers to try harder. The support can be limited to a few visits in certain cases, with rare cases requiring prolonged assistance.

These lactation consultants provide personal assistance to the mother of a new born child, helping her with technical issues, such as improving the baby’s latch, solving common problems faced by new mothers from engorged breasts to blocked ducts, making the mothers understand about the best way to ensure that their baby is getting enough milk, finding the causes for low milk production and relieving the engorgement of the breasts by using a breast pump.

These lactation consultants also provide appropriate care for the babies and their mothers by providing a holistic approach during antenatal and postnatal stage of child birth.

Breastfeeding support

These lactation consultants in India and abroad are trained through the International Board of Certified Lactation Consultants (IBCIC) to conduct free support group meetings and give telephonic and e-mail help to pregnant and breastfeeding mother voluntarily. They undergo extensive training in basic breastfeeding management. They visit maternity homes for antenatal and postnatal breastfeeding counselling and also undertake home visits.

Lactation consultants also provide much-needed assistance to the family members of first-time mothers. They provide assistance to the family members with information such as:

• The ‘hows’ and ‘whys’ of breastfeeding
• The ‘ins’ and ‘outs’ of positioning and latch
• Preventing and managing breastfeeding difficulties that may arise
• Breastfeeding twins or triplets
• Breastfeeding a premature baby or a baby with special needs
• Breastfeeding when medical issues arise with mother or baby
• Breastfeeding and returning to work or school

Currently, there are a handful of lactation consultants across the country, but there’s a need for more. Mothers need cheerleaders, people who can advocate for them and support them emotionally as they try to fulfil this responsibility to the infants. It can be a long journey from pumping for a fragile infant to direct breastfeeding. Breastfeeding is too important to let it slip away for lack of help or good information. Mothers need support at every step on their way. Women who wants to breastfeed and are unsuccessful in achieving their goals can be reminded of their loss each time they give their baby formula, experience an infant illness, or see other women breastfeeding.

A family with breastfeeding issues needs access to lactation support locally and quickly with minimal effort. A small investment in lactation care and services early in a child’s life reaps long term positive return on investment.