This is just a personal experience, and I can't justify it with any research, but I will share it just in case it might help.  I lost my gall bladder at about the time that my fourth child weaned.  Soon after we adopted our fifth baby, I developed nipple cracks that would hang open when he unlatched and were deep enough that there would be a little bit of milk in them.  Pumping made them worse.  I tried everything I'd ever heard might help.  I even nursed on one side for 48 hours and hand expressed the other.  At the end of that, it looked healed but the second he latched on, it broke open again.  Then, I remembered hearing that loss of the gall bladder could result in deficiency of fat-soluble vitamins.  I started taking 400 I.U. of vitamin E and 16,000 of vitamin A per day.  By the next day, the edges of the cracks were closing and within three days, they were completely closed.  I was nursing him and/or his younger sister for three and a half more years.  As long as I kept taking the E and A, the cracks stayed closed but if I went more than a few days without taking them, they would start to open up again.  I don't think that is the solution in many cases, but I do know of others who have done the same thing, with success.

I also know what the worst treatment for chronic nipple cracks is.  About 20 years ago, I had a friend who was struggling with that problem.  She went to one of the old docs here in town who was a GP, but everyone in town thought that he knew everything about everything.  He put silver nitrate on her nipples!  She was in pain for days and that was the end of breastfeeding for that baby.

 		 	   		  
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