Dear all:

I'm not quite understanding why a pediatrician would need to NOT be associated with breastfeeding -- to be a valid resource on newborn belly size.  It seems to me that a pediatrician NOT associated with breastfeeding should be something as completely nonsensical as having an endocriniologist who was NOT associated with healthy thyroid glands.  They need to KNOW about healthy thyroid glands in order to determine what is a diseased thyroid and be able to either bring it back to health or provide artificial substitutes for its function that may never be as good as the original.  Don't you have to know normal in order to deal with disease and disfunction?  So therefore, it seems to me that you would want a pediatrician and every pediatrician should know normal newborn stomach size when an infant is fed normally -- which is from the breast.  Just because some people can train themselves to eat 40 something hotdogs at the Nathan's HotDog eating contest doesn't mean that their capacity to overstretch their bellies is a good model for adult stomach size.

And on the topic of things I don't get. I still don't understand why Certified Lactation Counselors are allowed by other medical professionals to call themselves Consultants.  I just received an invitation to submit my resume to another one of those conglomerated practices that have been expanding in the New York City Area.  I dutifully checked their website and found a very perky cheerful lactation CONSULTANT who has never once attended a single New York Lactation Consultant Association website. Yes, Consultant.  What does she have?  A CLC.  Here's my analogy of how I feel this translates into other areas. 

You don't have to be a cardiologist or EMT  to become certified in CPR.  You can save lives if you know CPR.  It would be wonderful if everyone knew how to do CPR.  Nevertheless, just because you know CPR doesn't mean you are qualified to call yourself an EMT or a cardiologist.  

Best regards, Susan Burger

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