Oy vey!!!

        This is another for the book.  Nurses, trained nurses, are wondering
if the mother is excreting bilirubin through the milk.  And these are
the one's who are supposed to be helping the mother with breastfeeding
I suppose.  What's happening here.  Is the mother's milk yellow?
Maybe.  Why would it be yellow?  Because the baby probably has never
properly breastfed ever, and the milk is still yellow.  You see this
often with a poorly nursing baby, and the mature milk is mixed with
colostrum.

        Can baby absorb bilirubin from the gut.  Yes, of course.  This is the
enterohepatic circulation of bilirubin, and is one reason that
bilirubin is elevated in babies who are not nursing well.

        This mother and this baby need help breastfeeding.

Jack Newman, MD, FRCPC