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Subject:
From:
"Linda J. Smith" <[log in to unmask]>
Reply To:
Lactation Information and Discussion <[log in to unmask]>
Date:
Mon, 28 Dec 1998 18:51:36 -0500
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Regarding NOT using heat for engorgement - Slaughter on, Jan and Alison! You
are exactly RIGHT on this, and I've been ranting about this in lectures for
a long time too. Watch out for dead cows.

In a former life when I worked in athletic training, if I had applied heat
to a newly sprained ankle, I would have been fired on the spot. I learned
not to put heat on injured or swollen tissue in 1966 - more than 30 years
ago!! This is NOT new information. Use of cold on swollen/injured tissue has
been around since Rob was a young pup. Even the jock football players at my
college knew to ice down their swollen joints.

If breast "engorgement" was simply an oversupply of milk, it would just flow
out faster as the pressure in the alveoli increases. That's what happens
later when moms go too long between feeds: they leak - the system has a
built-in pressure relief mechanism. During engorgement, supposedly the
application of heat opens up the milk ducts. So, why are the ducts closed
off during engorgement so much that all that milk doesn't leak/flow out?
EDEMA!  Putting heat on edema makes it worse. If there's no edema, it
probably doesn't matter either way as there's nothing blocking the milk flow
in the ducts.

Linda J. Smith, BSE, FACCE, IBCLC
Bright Future Lactation Resource Centre
Dayton, OH USA
http://www.bflrc.com

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