First I want to say to Debi VanderMey - RIGHT ON!! My thoughts exactly!
Generation X (what a label??!) isn't doing so bad!

RE: Gentian violet:  Dr. Jack Newman gave an excellent presentation at the
Sept. 1995 BSC Symposium regarding gentian violet during which he touched on
the rat/cancer study from the UK.  He noted that it was an astronomical
dosage required that produced a quite rare liver toxicity - I think as it
translated to an infant, it would have meant something like 30mls consumed
daily for 2 years straight to produce such results!

Anyway, he recommends a quite minor regime that produces nice results - it
impressed one of our OB's last fall!  He suggests mom by a 1oz bottle of the
1% solution that is more that enough for the entire Rx (entire Rx uses about
1/4oz).  For 1X/side/day mom should dip a cotton swab in it, allow baby to
suckle swab, then immediately latch onto mom - it will sufficiently treat
both.  Note that it is actually done twice daily to get each nipple.  This
is carried out for 3 days and may be repeated for 3 more days.  After that
he recommends oral meds.

Though  messiness is a problem, he reassured me regarding the carcinogenic
scare.  Dr. Newman is a gem; he was a great reassurance to the OB I was
working with.  Anyone else with comments about this?

Debbie Shinskie RN CES IBCLC - Generation X'er who doesn't WANT to do it all!!