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Home › Articles › Breastfeeding › Breastfeeding Your Preemie

Breastfeeding Your Preemie

Breastfeeding Premature Infants

By Gail Pirics

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"Breastfed preemies also do better with breast than with a bottle because the baby has control over the flow of the milk. In the beginning, a baby may be too weak to latch on to Mom's breast and transfer milk, but they will eventually catch on."

Logistics: Fitting in at the Hospital
When a preemie is stable but not yet able to leave the hospital, parents are usually given nearly free access to the NICU to partake in the care and feeding of their baby. "The NICU is open 24 hours a day," Kolder says. "The only time we ask parents not to visit is during nursing rounds for confidentiality reasons, or if a baby has an emergency and we can't have other parents coming in."

Neonatal units usually work with parents to accommodate their schedules whenever possible. "We have to put babies on a feeding schedule, but we can change feedings to accommodate a mom's schedule so she has every opportunity to put her baby to breast," Kolder says. "We want the parents to visit whenever they can and encourage them to breastfeed whenever they can."

Like most hospitals, Lutheran General has segregated nurseries, which hold 10 babies per room. Privacy screens are provided for moms who want to pump bedside, and separate breastfeeding and pumping rooms are available for one-on-one time.

"In these situations the motherly duties are totally stripped away from them," Kolder says. "We encourage them to touch their babies, but they are so small that sometimes they are scared to even change a diaper. We encourage them to bing pictures and toys and sing and read to their babies. But when she can't even touch her baby, one of the most important things she can give is breastmilk, and only she can do that. We reinforce that no one else can do that and it could be a life-saving thing for her child. No medicine, no antibiotic can compete with what is provided by her body."


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