Hi Alicia!  We had a mom about a year or two ago who was in a car accident
at about 30 weeks of pregnancy.  The car seat belt kept her a prisoner in
the car as it started on fire after the crash.  She pleaded with her
husband to get out and let her be as they had a young child at home.  The
fire department arrived in the nick of time and helped her escape.

She was rushed to a community hospital where it was determined that she was
abrupting and then went into surgery for an emergency c-section.  Her baby
was delivered and spend a few weeks in their NICU.  The mother sent family
to us for a pump.  She called us periodically complaining of a sore breast
but we could not get her to come in for us to look at her.  She could never
make it in.  The family was Hispanic and had transportation troubles.  At
one point she went to the ER in the evening and was treated for mastitis,
although I do not think she really ever had mastitis, just this sore breast.

We finally saw her at several weeks post partum and she had a very large
mass, maybe about 10 cms or more on the upper outer quadrant of her left
breast.  She was pumping milk quite successfully for her baby.  I guessed
that perhaps this was a hematoma.  We called our favorite surgeon and the
rest is very regrettable.  We forgot to get photos!  We drove her twenty
minutes away to see the surgeon.  He too thought it was a hematoma and
attempted to evacuate it with a large bore needle.  To everyone's surprise,
he obtained nearly 10 ounces of milk!  She looked concave after the
procedure and he thought he would need to repeat this procedure again.  The
breast did not fill again.

I assume that a duct tore by the seat belt and she leaked milk into her
breast early on.

End of tale!

Kathleen Huggins

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