Hi, all. I spoke with a woman this morning who reported on her
friend, whom I never saw or spoke with since she lives in the Tel
Aviv area; please understand that the information is second-
hand. This was the woman's 2nd birth - the first ended tragically
with perforated uterus, C/S and fetal (or peri- neonatal) death.
Apparently the uterus perforated spontaneously. She then had a
couple of miscarriages, and then the present pregnancy, with
scheduled C/S (understandably, they didn't want her to labor AT
ALL!) on Jan. 18. The mother wanted to bf, but was not allowed -
they told her that they did not want the uterus to contract. I do
not know if she was given anything to counteract the natural
uterine contraction after parturition. Naturally, she was not
offered a pump, and nobody instructed her on manual expression.
The mother told her friend that she was not given the baby until
5 DAYS pp!!! When she finally was given the baby, she attempted
to nurse him anyhow, but her success apparently was quite
limited, and she had to supplement heavily and finally there just
was no more milk at all. The friend told me that the baby is now
pretty ill, has FUO, severely constipated, they think milk
allergy, constantly switching formula, etc. Sounds to me like his
doctor doesn't really have a game plan and is snatching at
straws. :-(
My question: was the hospital staff justified? Apparently this
woman has a fragile uterus, and I can certainly understand
everyone's extreme caution after the loss of the first baby, but
in view of all the trouble that this poor little 'un is having
with formula (OK, so everyone has 20/20 hindsight!), was this
extreme caution, i.e., avoiding uterine contraction which would
possibly be "harder" that that which would occur without bf,
really necessary? A really difficult call, IMHO. Sigh.
Judy Knopf, who sometimes hears about no easy answers, in Beer
Sheva, Israel  [log in to unmask]