Pardee,

You said you didn't understand why hospitals in my area don't have LCs on
staff. I really don't know why but let me give you some other information.

I live in a small, rural town of about 7000. The nearest (10 miles away) big
town (I guess it's considered a city) is Santa Rosa with a population of over
100,000. There are three hospitals there that deliver babies. As I mentioned,
only Kaiser has an LC on staff. One of the other hospitals is county-owned
and the other is a Catholic hospital. There is also a woman-owned
free-standing birth center in Santa Rosa and they do provide excellent
support for breastfeeding.

These hospitals do quite a few deliveries and the breastfeeding rate is
pretty good. I really don't know how the moms do it with very minimal
support.

Speaking for me personally, when I had my first child 12 years ago I got NO
support or BF information at the county hospital. The only reason I
successfully breastfed was because I was determined to make it work. I was
also lucky enough to share a hospital room with a woman who had given birth
to her second child and was breastfeeding. She gave me lots of good
information and was a great role model. She encouraged me to room in with my
son and never even put her baby in the isolette, she slept with the baby
right next to her and the baby nursed all the time.

I delivered my next three children at our Catholic hospital. With #2 and #3 I
received minimal support from hospital staff.

When my last child was born, I was involved with LLL and knew that one of the
OB nurses was also a private practice LC (the one who is now out of
business). When she was on shift I asked her to come in and check how
breastfeeding was going. She told me that she was not supposed to advertise
the fact at the hospital that she was an LC because the hospital felt she
would be using her position as an OB nurse to advertise her practice. Why
they didn't hire her as an LC is beyond me. . .

The hospitals here are very competitive and it seems to me that it would have
helped business for them to be able to advertise that they had an LC on staff
(this was before Kaiser was here so they would have been the first). It seems
they overlooked a very good marketing strategy!

Christine, I do know that the Kaiser hospitals in our area have LCs on staff.
I am an LLL Leader and when I feel a mother needs to be seen by an LC I
always ask her if she has Kaiser and point out that they do have LCs on
staff. I'm glad Kaiser recognizes the importance of LCs, I wish our other
hospitals would catch up!

Kim Balzer in Sebastopol, CA