- my iParenting
- quick clicks
- twins today articles
- twins today q&a
- message boards
- research baby names
- prepare a birth plan
- content channels
- ip channel rss feeds
- read birth stories
- read parenting stories
- recommended books
- e-newsletters
- safety recalls
- ip diaries
- ip store
- mom of the month
- dad of the month
- editor's letter
- letters to the editor
 |
- e-newsletters
- Sign up to receive our free weekly e-newsletters
- award-winning products
The iParenting Media Awards program helps parents find the best products for their families.
The Rush Mother's Milk Club
Providing Parents of Preemies With the Support to Breastfeed
By Teri Brown
Jameca Benjamin was just 17 years old when her premature baby was born. At 1 pound, 16 ounces, her baby girl needed all the attention she could get. She also needed breast milk. In a ground breaking new program, the Rush Mother's Milk Club at Rush-Presbyterian St. Luke's Medical Center in Chicago, Ill., helped Jameca Benjamin breastfeed her tiny baby.
"I don't think that breastfeeding my baby made the difference of life or death for her as it does for some babies," says Benjamin. "But it definitely made her healthier and made me a more confident mother, which is very important, especially for teen mothers."
Benjamin also credits the Mother's Milk Club with helping her be an assertive mother. "I was the first person in my family to breastfeed my child," says Benjamin. "I ran into some disapproval, but when I shared with them how important it was, they understood. Now they preach it everywhere!"
The Rush Mother's Milk Club made such an impact on Benjamin that she decided to become a peer counselor and help others breastfeed their low birth-weight babies. Her goal now is to go to nursing school and work in a neonatal unit.
The club originated in 1996. Meier came to Rush in a created position (which combined practice, research and education) to establish an evidence-based lactation program for Rush Presbyterian's 52-bed NICU.
"The name Rush Mother's Milk Club, which we have since trademarked, evolved from one of the mothers during our evening group discussions," says Meier. "She said, 'We're like a Milk Club,' and the name just seemed to capture the essence of the entire breastfeeding program."
Meier could very well be the first person in the USA to assume a clinically-based lactation position that focused exclusively on the NICU population. According to Meier, previous models of providing lactation support in the NICU focused on the use of a lactation consultant whose expertise was healthy infants and their mothers.
"These positions were often not successful, and never optimal, because lactation for the NICU population is a highly specialized area for which the average lactation consultant is not prepared and/or experienced," says Meier. "Similarly, my practice and research background is as a NICU bedside nurse, clinical nurse specialist (in the NICU) and doctorate of nursing science. Thus, for me, this role is the perfect fit: It blends doctoral nursing practice with years of bedside NICU experience."
When Meier took the position at Rush Presbyterian, the lactation initiation rate for the NICU was 17 percent, and no data was available on the average duration of milk expression for the mothers who began providing milk for their infants.
"Within a six-month period of time, our lactation initiation rate for the very low birth weight infants reached 72 percent of mothers, and our impact extended especially to populations within this designation that statistically have not chosen to provide milk: specifically, our low-income (WIC-eligible) women and African-American mothers," says Meier.
Over the years, Rush has added many special supports for this population, and has become the national model for providing breastfeeding services in the NICU.
Want to see more?
Comments
There are no comments for this article yet.Be the first to 
|
Post As:
|
||
| Enter your comment below: | ||
| Title | ||
| Comment Text | ||
| CAPTCHA | ||
| Please note that any comments submitted become the property of Disney Family / iParenting and can be edited and posted at our discrection. | ||
