My name is Melissa and I am a junior nursing student at the 
University of North Dakota.  I choose to join this listserv because I 
would like to become a NICU nurse.  A topic that I have interest in are 
the benefits of lactation support in the NICU.   I found some recent 
information on this topic that I would like to share. 
	In my research I found an article by Sisk, Lovelady, Dillard, and 
Gruber (2006) in which they suggest that many mothers of very low birth 
weight infants don’t breast feed due to anxiety.  
Authors of this article suggest that counseling mothers of very low birth 
weight infants is an effective way of increasing breast feeding success.  
They found that after receiving support from International Board Certified 
Lactation Consultants (IBCLC) breastfeeding success went from 21.5% to 
62.5%.  This article recommends that all mothers of very low birth weight 
infants be introduced to professional support such as an IBCLC.
	Smith, Durkin, Hinton, Bellinger, and Kuhn (2003) report that NICU 
infants are less likely to receive breast milk than healthy infants, even 
though they are far more vulnerable.  This article explains one of the 
reasons these infants are not receiving human milk is because of the lack 
of support from healthcare workers regarding breastfeeding.  Gonzalez et 
al. (2003) suggests all mothers with infants in a neonatal intensive care 
unit should receive some kind of lactation counseling.  This article also 
suggests that including IBCLC as members of the NICU team, results in 
infants that are more likely to receive the benefits of human milk.  
	The questions I have are as follows:  Do your units provide 
lactation counseling? 
If so, are the counselors International Board Certified Lactation 
Consultants (IBCLC)?  Have there been any noticeable positive effects, 
from the counseling on the mothers and infants?  Thank you in advance for 
any information, it is greatly appreciated.

Melissa Monroe, SN
University of North Dakota

References:

Gonzalez, K., Meinzen-Derr, J., Burke, B., Hibler, A., Kavinsky, B., Hess, 
S., Pickering, L., Morrow, A. (2003). Evaluation of lactation support 
service in a children’s hospital neonatal intensive care unit. Journal of 
Human Lactation, 19, 286-292.
Sisk, P., Lovelady, C., Dillard, R., Gruber, K. (2006). Lactation 
counseling for mothers of very low birth weight infants: Effect on 
maternal anxiety and infant intake of human milk. Pediatrics 2006, 117, 67-
75.
Smith, M., Durkin, M., Hinton, V., Bellinger D., Kuhn, L. (2003). 
Initiation of breastfeeding among mothers of very low birth weight 
infants. Pediatrics 2003, 111, 1337-1342. 

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