I am posting this case for my partner.
Mom is a second time breast feeder. Her first (now 6 y/o) was born with sever
immune system deficiencies and looks and acts like a 4 year old. Mom was told
that the daughter would never walk or talk (she is doing both although the
speech is not very clear--mom understands her)
Now to this baby. He is 3 months old. Mom has definite Oversupply Syndrome
but she has wounds on her nipple that will not heal.  She has been treated
for mastitis and then bacterial infection as a cause for the non healing
sores. All thrush avenues were treated and explored.
Mom reports that she can fee "lumps traveling through the breast," that exit
through the sores, making them bleed and making them reopen and enlarge. She
does not describe them as looking like plugs, rather as this blood covered,
hard bits. (We have asked her to bring in any of these objects that she may
obtain in the future for analysis in the lab.
These don't sound like standard thickened milk plugs. Here's the reason I
suspected calcium stones: up until recently mom was consuming 6 liters of
Pepsi per day. (She called herself a Pepsi addict.) My assumption is that
because carbonated beverages leech calcium from the bones and I have read of
women having sandy-type stones in the breast; the Pepsi is the cause. She has
slowly cut back to 1.5 liters of Pepsi per day and plans to gradually cut
that out.
Also she is pumping with an Isis so her older child can have at least 4 oz of
breastmilk per day to help with older child's immune function.
Are we on the right track? Or is the pump causing the nipple injuries? My
partner plans to have her pump with the classic in the office to see if it
will pull out any of these *bits.*
Does anyone else have any other input or ideas?
Marie Davis, RN, IBCLC
http://sites.netscape.net/mariedavisrnibclc/index.htm
      also at
 http://hometown.aol.com/davisrnclc/myhomepage/index.htm

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