Françoise Coudray wrote:
>is there a period she cannot/should not give her 
>blood (and why); concerning serous prolactin and 
>oxytocin peaks at some moments of lactating 
>days, would they be a condition for refusing a 
>lactating blood donor? concerning the rest of 
>blood constituents there are antiinflammatories, 
>hormones, cells (and so on) off lactation anyway 
>...
>
>could the "trouble" come from lactation hormones 
>or precautionary principle? (in France, no blood 
>donation before 6 months postpartum and in some 
>places: total declination but we are not a good 
>reference concerning breastfeeding!!)

Hi Françoise,
Before I had children (so over 20 years ago now) 
I worked at an Australian blood bank as a medical 
technologist and my understanding of the rule 
about not donating while breastfeeding was about 
concerns for the mother and baby, not the quality 
of the blood. I think they are worried that if 
something bad happened to mother or baby after a 
donation, that the donation could be considered a 
factor and the blood bank might have to admit 
liability. So it is possibly a legal issue with 
the health of mother and baby. They cannot afford 
to take even small theoretical risks with blood 
donors - better to reject the few with 
'complicated' situations.

I actually donated blood when my firstborn was 
about 18 months old - I purposely didn't tell 
them I was still breastfeeding and they didn't 
ask! Of course, now they have lengthy 
questionnaires and you can't avoid answering this 
question even if you are male or way beyond 
childbearing age!
-- 
******************************************************************
Joy Anderson B.Sc. Dip.Ed. Grad.Dip.Med.Tech. IBCLC
Australian Breastfeeding Association counsellor, Nutrition student
Perth, Western Australia.   mailto:[log in to unmask]
******************************************************************

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