Curiosity question how much training have you gotten on breastfeeding?

fergus51 · Sep 23, 2001

It depends on the amount of time a student spends in OB and what the hospital they're in does about BF. We have a lactation consultant who holds a lot of inservices for nurses on breast feeding and that seems to help a lot. As a student, I didn't get any formal training in breast feeding, but I did learn a lot in my clinical time on OB.

janleb · Sep 24, 2001

I am in my ob rotation, and the hospital I am at has a breastfeeding consultant on call. We have a class with her sometime this quarter. She is readily available if we need to ask any questions. I feel I am fortunate, I breastfed all three of my boys till they were a yr old. For the new moms that you are instructing the mechanics of breastfeeding can be learned, but as natural as it is especially for new moms emotional support is the upmost of importance.

BrandyBSN · Sep 24, 2001

Hate to be the bad guy here,,, but there is pretty strong research right now that breastfeeding clients should not take aleve.

The reason being that the active component works just like aspirin does, and it is excreted in the breast milk, which has had a reye's syndrome affect in some infants. PeptoBismol is also another no-no, as is any asprin containing, naproxen containing OTC. This is fairly new research, and it was in a nursing journal, we just went over it in class a few weeks ago. I will try to find out where the article was from, I believe the research is only a few months old.

In classes, we got 3 days on breastfeeding, and had clinicals with a lactation consultant (really neat stuff!).

Ill see if I can find that sometime this week :)

BrandyBSN

BrandyBSN · Sep 24, 2001

Found part of it...

The effects of Anaprox during pregnancy have not been adequately studied. If you are pregnant or plan to become pregnant, inform your doctor immediately. Avoid Anaprox and Aleve during the last 3 months of pregnancy. Anaprox appears in breast milk and could affect a nursing infant. If this medication is essential to your health, your doctor may advise you to discontinue breastfeeding until your treatment with this medication is finished.

Do not take any aspirin or anaprox (aleve) containing Medication during pregnancy or breastfeeding unless absolutely necessary for your continued health.

that is from the

Anaprox (Aleve) Site.

http://www.healthsquare.com/pdrfg/pd/monos/anaprox.htm

In my opinion, the doctor was correct, she should not be breastfeeding while on aleve. Reye's Syndrome is a terrible disease, not something to take lightly. The pharmacist might want to read this page if you want to print it out. It is very important that those filling prescriptions have the newest and most up-to-date information.

BrandyBSN

prmenrs, RN · Sep 24, 2001

I worked both days this weekend, and it seems like I have been spending almost all of my time grabbing a perfect stranger's breast in one hand, and her baby's head in the other, and trying to get the two of them together!!! :eek:

I guess after that, we 're not strangers after all!

seven · Sep 24, 2001

sweet nothing because i am in a STINKIN' CBL PROGRAM!!!

(but was thier q's on the final exam? you betcha. could i answer them? nope.)

TeresaRN2b · Sep 25, 2001

From what I have read it is okay to take Aleve after the baby is one month old. It wasn't just the pharmacist that gave her the go ahead it was also her pediatrician. I suppose that wasn't even my point though. My point was more that there are other alternative meds to try before telling a patient to stop breastfeeding. Also you have to way out the risks of quitting breastfeeding on a baby's health over the risk of the mother taking medication. I think that is so great that you got such good training in your school. I am so glad to hear schools are training nurses a little more adequately on this now.

Teresa

KristaB · Sep 25, 2001

Teresa,

You should check on the LACTNET archive or even post a question to the list. Lots of lactation consultants and MDs with extensive breastfeeding knowledge.

http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/lactnet.html

Naproxin is an approved medication for breastfeeding mothers according to the AAP and Thomas Hale, who has written extensively on medications and breastfeeding (Medications and Mother's Milk). He has a website: http://neonatal.ttuhsc.edu/lact/index.html

Hope this helps! Doctors are often the worst informed health care professionals on breastfeeding matters, unfortunately.

Krista

KristaB · Sep 25, 2001

Originally posted by TeresaRN2b
I suppose that wasn't even my point though. My point was more that there are other alternative meds to try before telling a patient to stop breastfeeding. Also you have to way out the risks of quitting breastfeeding on a baby's health over the risk of the mother taking medication.

This is an excellent point. If one med is contraindicated in breastfeeding (there aren't really that many that *are*), there is always another that can be prescribed in its place with similar therapeutic effects. Unless we're talking chemotherapy, it is almost never in the baby's or mother's best interest to stop breastfeeding because of a prescription medication. If necessary, there are alternatives, like finding out the time it takes for the drug to be excreted by the body and when the maximum tolerable amount is in the bloodstream, and waiting for that length of time to nurse (that information is in Hale's book that I mentioned above). Often times, the body breaks down the drug within an hour or two, and it isn't even an issue as long as mom nurses right before taking the medication.

There are just too many misconceptions about breastfeeding, and we need *all* health care providers to attain more and better education about it, even the ones (like the ER docs) that think they don't need it and practice medicine with the three hours they learned about lactation in medical school.

I've been lucky that in my almost six continuous years of breastfeeding (between all three of my kids!), I've only been to the ER once, and that doctor had a wife that was nursing a toddler. :)

Krista, stepping off the soapbox for now

BrandyBSN · Sep 25, 2001

I do agree. There are so many guaranteed benefits to breastfeeding that I would not recommend that a mother quit breastfeeding unless absolutely necessary.

This discussion does prove a point though. Its so hard to stay "on top" of new med regulations when every source says something different. One person read that it was ok, the site I look at says its not, and no one really knows what to believe! It sure does make it frustrating :) I'm sure docs have the same trouble we do. No one reads the same book, so everyone has a different part of the picture. Pretty hard to know which one is more correct. :confused:

You would think that they would make things easier on us! :rolleyes:

BrandyBSN

crnasomeday · Sep 25, 2001

We got quite a bit of info on BF. That may be partly because the semester coordinator is an OB nurse and has done much research on lactation and BF though. Nursing students should at the very least be getting the information to be able to tell new moms how to position the baby and initiate latch-on, as well as how to tell adequate sucking, what bowel movements should look like, how often baby should be fed, and the number of dirty and wet diapers a baby should have per day when BF.

Now, the Aleve thing. . . I agree with Brandy and Krista. If you look Naproxen up in the drug book, at least in the 2000 editions, you'll see that it is contraindicated for use during pregnancy and lactation. Telling the mom to quit BF is weird though...why not recommend something that she can take while BF.