Our Nursing Mothers group (Delaware,PA, MD) has been giving four local
hospitals and birthing center a discharge pack for their breastfeeding
mothers.  It contains washable nursing pads, a booklet written especially
for the first weeks at home (short and easily read for those stressed out
days), magnet with the support group's phone number, and a sports bottle
imprinted with the support group's logo and phone number.  These packs
are being supplied to the birthing facilities at no charge to them (heavy
grant writing and fund raising on the support group's part).


The research we found said that it was not the supportive breastfeeding
pack but the absence of the formula discharge pack that led women to
breastfeed longer.  When we first approached the largest hospital, we had
to appear before the Pediatric committee to ask that these packs be given
out INSTEAD of the formula packs.  They agreed to offer a mom a choice of
which pack the mother would take home (formula or Nursing Mothers).  They
soon forgot that promise and are giving out both.

In designing the gift pack, we found out that the peds didn't want us to
include any baby creams or oils (the peds were not recommending that
mothers use these products on their babies).  We also were not able to
include any commercial advertisements, coupons, etc.  The hospital says
they have to stand behind any product they recommend or give out
(liability issue which this hospital is very sensitive about). We
concentrated on products that would support mothers and give them a
number to call if they needed help.  We found that calls to our
organization went up dramatically when the packs began to be given out.

Cudos to this group from Delaware who do all the work to get these
packets funded, supplied, and delivered to the birthing facilities in
hopes of supporting breastfeeding mothers.

Terriann Shell