I work in an Australian NICU where we often look after omphalocele and gastroschesis babies.these days surgeons attempt to replace their guts the same day they are born,in the unit and not theatre.Although ,there are some incidence when so much is outside that it is difficult to just push it back and they have to go to theatre ,if the abdominal space is not big enough for the gut etc to fit back in then they may have to put it in a special type of bag and string it up so that it goes back into the abdominal space by gravity.This may take some time before they can close over the external abdominal wall. These babies generally are feed not with IV fluids but transparental nutrition and lipids,these are their electrolytes,amino acids,minerals ,fats etc not as good as breast milk and yes they certainly don't gain weight as well. Once the gut is considered able to tolerate EBM then it will be tried. It can be sometime before they progress from NG/OG tube feeds to breast feeds. We've had mums who have expressed for ages before their babies had their finally surgery and went to the breast. she can probably reduce her expressing down to 6 times a day,as long as she keeps her supply going and increase the number once baby is on full EBM feeds to build up her supply again. Surely the hospital should be able to store some of her milk, can she store some at home and perhaps donate some if there is too much to store.The hospital should be encouraging her to keep expressing and finding ways to ensure storage of her EBM until baby is able to tolerate it.These type of babies benefit from having EBM in the long run. If you can find someone who has been through the same situation that she can talk to would be extremely helpful to her. Hope this is of some help Anne Clements RN EM BNS Brisbane QLD Australia *********************************************** The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html