No authority here, but I recently had to dig up some info on this topic
for a mother with a thriving six-month-old, who was getting pressure to
wean because of the mother's high cholesterol levels.
Breastfeeding mothers do tend tend to have elevated cholesterol levels
(and her doctor didn't share that information with her, so she was
*really* concerned. She has a strong family history of high
cholesterol, so her baseline was probably fairly high to begin with.)
But since this seems to be common reaction, and breastfeeding is the
healthy, natural next step from being pregnant, it's a big jump to
assume that this mother needs immediate medication. Several studies,
Knopp, R.H., et al."Effect of Postpartum Lactation on Lipoproteins,
Lipids and Apoproteins." Journal of Clinical Endocrinology and
Metabolism (March 1985): 542-47,
Oyer D, Stone NJ. Cholesterol levels and the breast-feeding mom. JAMA
Feb. 17, 1989;261(7):1064.
found that often the "good" HDL increased in greater proportion.
The Lactnet archives had several useful posts on this topic, several of
which observed that high cholesterol becomes a risk factor over decades,
and that for a reasonably healthy woman of childbearing age, elevated
levels for a few years of lactation probably do not represent a
untenable risk, considering the health benefits of breastfeeding for
both mother and baby (especially since this baby is likely inheriting a
genetic tendency toward high cholesterol.)
At the forums at Dr. Hale's Website,
http://neonatal.ttuhsc.edu/lact/
searching with "cholesterol" brings up several short answers to specific
queries, in which he discouraged the use of lipid-lowering drugs during
Latino because cholesterol in breastmilk is important to infant
development. He also concurs that a few years of elevated levels are
probably a fairly small risk.
Back to this particular mother, who did *not* want to wean, she planned
to discuss the issue further with her doctor, have him break down the
total number as to the "good" and "bad" cholesterol, and to start on a
higher fiber/lower fat diet as the first line of attack.
Margaret
LLLL
P.S. My Area Professional Liaison (the LLL person who helps Leaders dig
up medical information) pulled several abstracts on this topic from
PubMed for me.
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