Like Kirsten, I am also relatively new to Lactnet, which I am finding very interesting. I am a lecturer at the Otago Polytechnic Departmentl of Nursing and Midwifery in Dunedin, New Zealand, and also a long term neonatal intensive care nurse. While not an LC, I am committed to breast feeding for all babies, and particularly recognise the advantages for the preterm baby and family. I was most interested to hear that some areas are successfully BF quite small babies after discharge (Kirsten cites 4 pounds, 34 weeks, I think). We, too, find that babies of this age and size will often do really well on a three hourly feeding regime, but often they are just not awake enough to manage all these feeds by themselves, or to demand feed successfully. We still find that we need to give a fair number of tube feeds (we won't bottle feed a baby that is learning to breast feed). However, we are starting to look more into the early discharge of such babies, and I would really welcome your comments or any references regarding the successful BF management of such small babies at home. I would love to receive any copies of your policies/protocols, and to generate some discussion on lact-net. Sincerely, Sarah Gamble