What do you think about a nurse breastfeeding infant at nurse's station during break?

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what do you think about a nurse breastfeeding her infant at the l&d nurse's station during a break?

Specializes in Telemetry, Nursery, Post-Partum.
I think this is just an issue of professionalism:

1. If you're at the nurses station you should be at the nurses station, available to patients. Even if the nurse in question was ready and willing to ditch her baby the moment I (being a patient or a fellow nurse) needed her, I wouldn't feel like I could ask her for anything because I wouldn't want to interrupt her.

2. People have issues about seeing breastfeeding in public and at work in a hospital it not the time or place to make a stand about it. As we try to battle misconceptions about nursing (as a profession) we don't need to battle misconceptions about nursing (breastfeeding) at the same time.

While I don't mind people doing it in public, I don't think it should be out in the open at work. It's unprofessional. It makes you appear distracted and your patient should have 100% of your attention. Because you're at work.

I don't mind seeing people brush their teeth (it's natural, it's necessary, it can be awfully distracting to go without) but I wouldn't dream of brushing my teeth at the nurses station.

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I agree with this and wanted to add, assuming the work station is one that's open to patients/visitors coming up to it...how do the patients know the nurse is on a break? If you read any non-nursing forums, you can easily read people complaining about the nurses being lazy, sitting around, etc, etc when we know we are busy trying to catch up on paperwork, the patients think we are doing nothing but sitting. So, can you imagine what they think walking up to the desk and seeing someone nursing a baby? Really, its unprofessional. Although I will admit probably easier than finding somewhere to pump and store the breast milk before being able to give it to the baby in a bottle, it just doesn't need to be done at the nurse's station.

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Specializes in Pediatric ED.
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If you read any non-nursing forums, you can easily read people complaining about the nurses being lazy, sitting around, etc, etc when we know we are busy trying to catch up on paperwork, the patients think we are doing nothing but sitting. So, can you imagine what they think walking up to the desk and seeing someone nursing a baby?

Exactly what I was driving at with us already having to battle misconceptions about what it is we do. People already think we don't do anything but sit around and gossip, you know they'd say "She had time to sit there and nurse her baby but couldn't bring us more ice chips!!!! We're never going back there!" :uhoh3: :uhoh3: :uhoh3:

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Specializes in LTC and MED-SURG.

Breast feeding, bottle feeding, spoon feeding. Anything other than work at the nurse's station, just seems inappropriate to me. If I was a patient or visitor, that would just seem so out-of-place. My :twocents:.

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in a way it's kind of a teaching oppertunity if patients see - I agree a quiet place would be nicer for her,, if she's on break some one should be covering her patients so its all good.. Breaking at the desk doesnt seem like much of a break though.. I typiclly give my cell number to who's covering me and go hide

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Specializes in Emergency.

I'm wondering why you would want to bring your infant to work and breastfeed them in the hospital...can we say GERMS?

My coworkers pump at work, and we gladly accomodate breaks for them. But I wouldn't bring my child into a hospital - unless they were the patient.

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Specializes in Aged Care, Midwifery, Palliative Care.

I wouldn't have an issue with it, especially on a L&D floor. Not that I would feel comfortable doing it, but I wouldn't feel uncomfortable or have any issues with someone else choosing to.

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from a previous post: i mean what if someone walks up and gets the wrong idea, that this nurse is breastfeeding random infants??

:chuckle i'm sorry...but reading this gave me a picture of some wacky patient satisfaction campaign..."our l&d is full service!"

we joke about this all the time when moms leave their babies in the nursery for the night and have asked that the baby have no bottle or pacifier.

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I'm going to jump on the "I'd never bring my baby into the hospital" bandwagon.

C-Diff, Rotavirus, RSV, varicella. Yuck!

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Specializes in Community, OB, Nursery.

I am of several minds about this:

1) I'm not really opposed to the idea of someone breastfeeding their child at work, assuming her patients are taken care of. I really don't even mind the whole exposed boob issue. In so many other countries a mother exposing a breast to feed a child does not even warrant a second look, even in the most public of places.

2) But I do agree with those who say that hospitals are NOT the cleanest of places for babies to be. I don't even take my 3yo to work with me for staff mtgs for the same reason, though some coworkers do. That would be my only hang-up.

3) As long as said coworker pulls her weight the rest of the shift and offers to help me when she's not nursing/pumping, I really wouldn't care. It's easy enough to be discreet if that is a concern.

That's just crunchy granola me.

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Specializes in ER/Nuero/PHN/LTC/Skilled/Alzheimer's.

WHy is the child at work with mom? SHouldn't it be in daycare or at home? Or did I miss a post about why the baby is there in the first place?

I work in ED where we really get some of the sickest people (physically and mentally) and I just can't imagine breastfeeding my baby at our open nurses' station with the recurrent ER pervert staring at me the whole time. Not to mention the patients complain we sit at the desk too much as is (well, duh, how am I supposed to get your discharge info ready?). I can just see the PG survey score now:no:.

But if the mom has no other place and baby has to be fed, I'd still take the tyke to the break room or bathroom or even an empty patient room. Plus our docs have an on-call room in the back, so I guess we could use that too.

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what do you think about a nurse breastfeeding her infant at the l&d nurse's station during a break?

why is this the child at work with the mother?

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Let me start by saying I agree that breastfeeding at the nurses' station is not professional. However, my family brought my son in a couple of times a shift to nurse on my breaks or lunch. I always did it discreetly, away from the public.

My kids came to see me at work all the time. (There is actually a long thread about this somewhere). When my youngest would come in he knew right where the graham crackers and crushed ice were. Granted, I worked in a very small rural hospital where this was no big deal.

As to other people nursing your infant - I know two women who are best friends and had infants at the same time. One of them needed emergency surgery and the other took care of her child, which included breastfeeding that child. I think that was very sweet.

Being a wetnurse was and still is in some cultures normal.

steph

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