Lynn Shea asks: My question to them and others in NICUs involves brfdng. f/u once discharged. Unfortunately our NICU follow up is catch as catch can due to lack of resources. NICU moms are welcome to call our lactation center at any time after discharge for telephone advice and also can make an appointment in our outpatient clinic for bfdg help. I would say that most do not. We have a 40 bed NICU and a 20 bed intermediate care nursery and we staff with 2-3 LC's per day during the week and one on each weekend day. We cover referals from post partum (average 6-12 per day) NICU, IICN, outpatient and any bfdg mother who has had a baby admitted anywhere in the children's hospital. This amounts to what feels like a finger in the dike. I think a good follow up program would involve a call several days after discharge and weekly follow up for the first month or so. It would also be wonderful to collect data on milk production, breastfeeding initiation and duration and look at breastfeeding outcomes as they relate to degree of prematurity in this population. Like Jan Wheaton the studies are all in my head. Kathy Boggs, RN, IBCLC Mountain View, CA 94040 *********************************************** The LACTNET mailing list is powered by L-Soft's renowned LISTSERV(R) list management software together with L-Soft's LSMTP(TM) mailer for lightning fast mail delivery. For more information, go to: http://www.lsoft.com/LISTSERV-powered.html