How about NOT doing pre-post weights.  Everything I've read on the subject indicates that isolated test weighings are useless for gauging a mother's milk production.  To get anything resembling an accurate result, pre-post weights must be done for 48 hours+, every nursing, because intake varies throughout the day.

What often happens is that a mother is told she's not making enough milk based on that isolated pre-post weighing, done in the stressful environment of a public breastfeeding clinic.  The solution? formula (i.e., bigger meals).  

Why are women supposedly making milk in amounts deemed to be insufficient not just told to nurse their babies more often?  If you need whatever amount of milk, and (again supposedly) only make a small portion of that at one time, if you increase the number of opportunities to take in that amount, you'll get to your goal. (more frequent meals, respecting the size of infant stomachs).

This is a huge pet peeve of mine - LCs are supposed to provide EVIDENCE-BASED assistance to breastfeeding  women.  Where is your evidence for pre-post weighing as anything but destructive to breastfeeding?

On the opposite side of the danger of pre-post weighing, I once heard an LC tell a mother who had a 'good' test weight that she didn't need to nurse her baby more than every 4 hours or so.  This is a woman who teaches a breastfeeding class, during which she frequently stresses the importance of evidence-based practice.  

Ingrid

-----Original Message-----
From: Lactation Information and Discussion [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Lea Rivera Todaro
Sent: Wednesday, September 22, 2010 7:05 AM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Recommendation for a Scale

Yea! Our clinic just got budget approval for a scale.  We don't have a permanent home in the hospital -- we have to share with other providers, so we need a scale that is portable but sensitive enough to do pre-post feed weighs.

Any suggestions?

Thank you in advance!

Lea Rivera Todaro, MA, IBCLC
Brooklyn - Queens, NY

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