Hi All, In response to Melinda's question, I quite believe there cannot be a "standard" number, because lactation programs vary in scope of services provided. I've heard 1:1000 tossed about, and I firmly believe in order to do a qualtiy job that is not enough hours given the number of non-latching babies and the ever increasing c/d rate which increases the average daily census we are responsible for. We are extremely fortunate to have 3.7 FTE's for 3000 births, including one full time NICU LC for our level 3 NICU. Questions you need to answer are: Level of NICU services and breastfeeding initiation rate among those moms Postpartum initiation rate Average length of stay Do you see all moms or just those with problems or by physician order Do you provide phone followups Do you provide outpatient services within the hosptal setting Are you open 7 days per week and for what number of hours I can honestly say, that one LC can manage about 10-12 inpatients per day without significant problems and about 2 outpatients plus 8 - 10 phone calls. . If you also need to be going to "meetings", faxing info, doing research, and retail sales, or other committee work then the above numbers will not work. You also need to consider the amount of vacation/sick hours/conference time you'll need to cover. and work that into the numbers. It really adds up to more than you realize in order to give quality service every day. Needless to say, not everyone recognizes this and tries to do more for less, and effects the overall outcomes that we see. LuAnn Smith RN, IBCLC While I'm enjoying a cup of tea On a foggy, dreary day in Pennsylvania *********************************************** To temporarily stop your subscription: set lactnet nomail To start it again: set lactnet mail (or digest) To unsubscribe: unsubscribe lactnet All commands go to [log in to unmask] The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(R) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html