At 9:52 pm +0000 19/11/00, Kathy Eng wrote:

>  Plus we give a bottle of glucose water in the nursery right
>after birth (they are allowed to breastfeed first). I try to advocate
>waiting as long as the nurse will let me. Sometimes we have to do some
>bottle feeding to satisfy the staff and doctors until baby decides to eat on
>his own. I do a lot of teaching moms how to teach their babies to suck and
>swallow at the breast.
>
>Yes, it makes me crazy that we have come so far past what is really "normal"
>in the course of breastfeeding and childbirth. What is so common now is
>considered normal, and when we actually get an alert and vigorous nurser,
>everyone is amazed!


  Kathy.....that must be so frustrating.  It is such an example of the
institution's needs taking precedence over mothers' and babies' needs.

Babies being 'allowed' to breastfeed first....says it all, really doesn't it?

How do the doctors at your unit justify giving glucose to healthy
term newborns? In the year 2000?

I'd be driven crazy, too.....: (

Heather Welford Neil
NCT bfcs Newcastle upon Tyne UK

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