The last year I worked for the WIC Program in a coastal county of Florida,
51% of those intiating breastfeeding had smoked during their pregnancy.  This
was a relatively small site with approximately 40-50 new clients per month.
Our "ever breastfed" statistics were at that time about 59% of the total
population. Two-thirds of those intiating breastfeeding did quit smoking at
some time during their pregnancy.

I was tracking these statistics the last year I was there because of a
problem that had come up repeatly of mothers saying that  their baby's
behavior was better after formula feeds and that the baby was extremely fussy
after breastfeeding.(It was very rare to see exclusive breastfeeding).  With
the first few mothers I dismissed their descriptions--believing that it was
diet related or an excuse to quit.  But the descriptions were so similiar and
it happened often enough to alert me.  I went back over their records and
everyone that described this fussiness was a smoker.

Many of the women who continued to smoke during their pregnancy had preterm
babies.  Which is an expensive burden on the system--they were the ones
needing the loan of a breast pump.  They would have the added stress of
separation(sometimes 60-120 miles away from their infant--no
transportation!!!).  As an ex-smoker I know that the added stress would only
add to the need to have a cig.  But a woman who smokes during her pregnancy
is a more at risk for complications.  Therefore she may have more problems to
contend with to get breastfeeding off to a good start.  As an aside, during
the fires and heavy smoke that surrounded this County in 1998, we all noticed
that preterm birth skyrocketed.  Within that week of the heaviest smoke, we
did not have enough electric pumps to loan out for all the mothers who give
birth to preterm infants.  Normal needs at that time per week for the whole
county averaged about 2-3 pumps.  During that week of the heaviest smoke, we
needed about 3 times our average.

The other part of the story was alot of these moms who smoked were teens and
single moms.  So it shouldn't be surprising in the current system that
breastfeeding may be difficult to initiate and maintain.  It seems obvious to
me that these mothers during their pregnancy need more interventions to help
them quit smoking.  It certainly would be a cost effective method to prevent
preterm births and encourage longer breastfeeding.  Valerie W. McClain, IBCLC

             ***********************************************
The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned
LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM)
mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to:
http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html