Marsha said: "Under the Title V Maternal/Child Block Grant program, each
state is required
to report on their breastfeeding rates as a Performance Measure. State
results and yearly progress can be tracked at www.mchdata.net. Performance
Measure #9 is the breastfeeding measure which uses the same goal as HP2010.
At the above website you can see the number of births in each state, the
number of mothers who exclusively breastfeed at hospital discharge, what
percentage this is, and what the state's goal is."

I checked out this site.  Based solely on my own state's info, I seriously
doubt these are "exclusive" BFing rates.  It's very possible the figures are
actually initiation rates.  They really do need some sort of standard for
reporting that could easily be part of the parameters of Title V.  Not
surprising, Washington and Alaska had the reported highest initiation rates.
I also noted that the Ross Survey was one of their main sources of research
info.

I have been collecting chart data at my hospital.  The patient population is
mostly (my estm 95%) low income Medicaid people.  Our initiation rates (at
least one documented breastfeed or bottle feeding of EBM, depending on which
level of care baby is in) is creeping up to 77% for June,'01.  However our
exclusive BF rate is 4% (NO documented feed of ABM at any time).  If we
could resolve the issue of stuffing the baby with a full bottle of ABM so
baby will sleep thru the hearing test, our exclusive BF rate would be
higher.  The RNs "don't have time" to call mom in to BF baby to sleep for
the test.  Private hospitals in my area likely have a higher exclusive BF
rate than we do.  However, we DO have the lowest c-sec rate in the city -
15% - maybe even the state.

Our BF initiation rate will grow shortly.  Our Head Neo is spearheading an
effort to have every NICU mom start pumping asap after birth.  He is driven
primarily on research about NEC risks for preemies.  Too often, we LCs were
called in to help a NICU mom pump 3 hours before discharge.  Sometimes she'd
had a c-sec and this was the first we heard about her need.  Soon, we will
have Standing Orders for a pump and an LC consult on all NICU moms!

Note that we are averaging 450 births a month, so we rely on MD / RN
referrals for our consults.  Occasionally, we have even been snagged in the
hall by a family member asking for LC help.

Phyllis Adamson, IBCLC
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