May 16, Susan Moxley wrote: She finds that L & D nurses do not see themselves as part of the process of breastfeeding, that is the role of the post-partum nurse. She is often sabotaged in her atempts to work with these mothers, they will send her to a coffee break and when she gets back the infant has been "shipped" to the nursery! As a nurse I feel outraged that other nurses would do this. The window of opportunity for correct latch, suck is that first hour or so, we know it is associated with successful breastfeeding from research. It also provides the mother and infant with positive reinforcement. Research tells us that infants who are separated from their mother in this period have more disorganized suck patterns. Therefore it would seem to me appropriate to work hard at changing the policies and practices in the labour and delivery area and get these nurses to recognize what a major role they have in the process of successful breastfeeding. They need education, polices must be changed to give the mother and infant unlimited access and so on. *** There is a wonderful 6 minute video that speaks volumes on the importance of those first few minutes after delivery that can help educate the Labor and Delivery nurses who apparently need a reality check(!). It is called "Delivery Self Attachment" and shows some of Righard's studies in Sweden concerning the effects of medications and separation after birth on a baby's ability to latch on unassisted. He shows 3 different mother-baby pairs. The first is an unmedicated birth, no separation. Baby is placed on mom's bare chest and allowed to "do his thing" with no help from mom. He crawls up mom's chest, finds the nipple, latches on, and sucks! The first time I saw that I was totally amazed. Then I found myself totally amazed that I was amazed. We have gotten SO far away from the "natural" way of doing things that we don't even recognize our ability to do what other mammals do routinely! The second baby I think is both medicated and separated from mom for a number of hours. When this baby is placed on mom's chest, it is as if he has no purpose and no idea why he is there. Even with help from mom he is unable to successfully latch on. I never can remember what the third baby is--some intermediate between the two (anybody else remember?) and this baby is able to latch on, though not as quickly as the first. This 6 minute film says SO much in so LITTLE time and might be an eye opener to those nurses. Seems like it is available through Kittie Franz? Dr. Righard will be speaking at the LLLI conference this summer in Chicago. I hope he is as good as his film! Melissa Vickers, IBCLC [log in to unmask]