I am sad to say that this mother made a choice to stop
breastfeeding shortly after I posted the email.
She used cabbage leaves and a gradual reduction in
expressing in the both breasts to dry up her milk supply.I
am pleased to say that her mastitis didnt get worse. She is
currently still on Erythromycin and Diflucan and the redness
has faded on the breast with mastitis but is still looking
pinkish(improving daily) and feels 'thickened'between 3-9
oclock (mothers description).She had an ultrasound that
showed no abcess or any other abnormailties.
She did comment to me just yesterday that when she had a
mammogram 18mths ago the Dr told her "her breasts were
'lumpy'" but the mother couldn't feel the lumps at that
time.
Could the lower half of that breast be slower to drain
because of the 'lumpiness' and hence could  she have been at
a greater
risk of mastitis after say a cracked nipple and the
introduction of staphlococcus?


Barbara Fletcher
RGON IBCLC
New Zealand


From previous posting.....

Her baby girl was born 7 weeks ago after a normal
delivery.Breastfeeding got off to a good start but at 9 days
she got mastitis in her L breast from 3-9 oclock
inclusive.She was started on Flucloxacillin and continued
onthis for 3 1/2 weeks. She tells me that the redness in the
breast never really went away but it was felt that she had
'been on them long enough'. I saw her 5 days later and once
again there her L breast was very red from 3-9 oclock. I
rang her Dr saying that I felt she needed IV antibiotics for
the mastitis and treatment for thrush. The Dr commenced her
on Diflucan as well as topical treatment for Mum and oral
gel for baby. She was admitted to hospital several hours
later and was started on IV Flucloxacillin.After 48 hours
the mother was discharged home on a further 4 days oral
antibiotics. The redness had only faded slightly.The mother
was still in a lot of pain both feeding from the R breast
and pumping from L breast. She could only hand express from
the left breast as the L nipple was starting to break down
from using the electric pump in hospital. Ice prior to a
pumping helped with the flow of milk from the L side.Baby is
feeding from the R breast and taking EBM from L breast via
bottle and gaining well.
Mum was in a lot of pain and the L breast redness didnt seem
to be resolving so she went back to her Dr who changed the
antibiotic to Erythromycin. During this time of antibiotics
the mother also consulted a homoeopath who prescribed
homeoopathic Staphlococcus and Streptococcus 1M. As yet
there has been no change to the L breast.
The mother is currently taking painkillers regularly so she
can feed but is now close to giving up.
Other suggestions I have made to her is to hand express or
pump while leaning over to get  more drainage from the area
concerned and using ice.
The mother did mention that once she had to have an
operation on one of her toes. She ended up with an infection
that required 5 days of IV antibiotics and 5 days of oral
before an improvement was seen.

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