I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before - personal experience
My second son had hyaline membrane disease and spent a week in NICU. WIth a
'standing order' from me that I was to be woken, day or night, the first
time they thought he was ready to suck a feed (he was being tube fed). ON
about day 3 they rang me at 5am (I was still an inpatient) to ask me to come
down. He was agitated and distressed to the point where his oxygen
saturation was dropping and they didn't know what to try next.  So they
wanted to try breastfeeding him .
So down I go, he latches like he's been breastfeeding for months, an VOILA!
O2 sats up to 99% - the highest they had ever been.

The moral of the story is not just how well his respiratory function was
coping with breastfeeding, but also that I walked out of the NICU with tears
of joy that I had finally been able to do something to help my baby, after
sitting by frustrated for three days. It has an enormous impact on the mums
as well as the babies

Kirsten Blacker
RN RM
Australia
mum to James (Oct 97) and nursling Matthew (Mar 99 - the nicu boy!)

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