Kim asked about lactation consulting as a career path.  I was interested in the
comments that hospitals in her area do not seem to be hiring LCs on staff.  I do
not understand that.  I thought that California had a high penetration of
capitated groups.  How can a managed care provider afford NOT to have a high
percent of their market breastfeeding?  And how can these mothers breastfeed
without any help?  (Around here the attidude of mothers and hospital nurses and
physicians is that a mother has to be seen by the IBCLC to breastfeed!)

I think that lactation has great potential.  It our job to be sure that those
who can make a difference understand breastfeeding and IBCLCs.  We must promote
our value at every opportunity and more.  The more we can integrate ourselves
and our services into existing structure, the greater the chance that we will be
taken seriously.

I also am convinced that those of us who are female must remove ourselves from
nursing to do much in lactation.  It may not be the case in other areas, but in
the southeast, the nurse who credentials as IBCLC is still considered the nurse
and is often given nursing duties that crowd out lactation.  They also tend to
be locked into a lower salary range.

The nurses that do seem to do well in the hospital setting have completely
removed themselves from nursing as much as possible.  Of course, how possible
this is varies institution to institution.

But back to the field of lactation as a career choice.  IF the hospitals are
marketing their services to managed care providers, having lactation support and
services available could be a marketing tool.  Remember that it is important to
keep the capitated population healthy = $$$ to managed care provider.  It is
important to have patient charges to the hospital (if they are still using the
old style arrangement) = $$$ to hospital.  Lactation support and services can do
both.

Market, market, market.


Pardee