Hello!
Does anyone have recommendations for a Speech Thrapist who knows how to support babies with cleft palate to breastfeed?
I have a family here who has simply been told by the cleft palate team that they have never seen any cleft palate baby breastfeed. 
Baby has a cleft soft palate, and had actually latched successfully a few times. And induced a MER on the 3rd day. 
But then the cleft was discovered. They were immediately given the Dr Brown bottle where baby only has to bite to get milk, and the suck became extremely disorganized after. We have not been able to get him to latch and breastfeed since then.
Baby also has a posterior tongue tie.
The cleft palate team does not think that is worth clipping at this time, since he is "doing well with bottle feeds."
The surgeon was also discouraging an obturator, saying it would just add more stress to feeds.

However, baby, now 3 months old, does not do well on any milk but his mothers milk - donor milk or formula. At the same time, her milk supply is starting to go down.

Baby has also recently stopped gaining weight. He was gaining well over an ounce a day for quite a while. However, in the past 2 weeks he has only gaines a few ounces. He is about 13 weeks old. 

He just takes so long for each feed, its hard to get enough volume into him. They will likely be recommended to fortify with formula soon.

I am hoping to find some practitioners around here who have helped other cleft palate babies breastfeed.

Sadly, only myself and the pediatric physical therapist has said it is possible. The rest of the practitioners (cleft palate team, various speech therapists, regular pediatric doctor) have not been encouraging. 

Thanks for any help or resources you have to share!

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