Posted on 09/24/2006 3:38:13 PM PDT by Mrs. Don-o
BLOOMINGTON The first of several breast milk collection sites has opened as part of a state plan intended in part to benefit ill and premature infants.
State health commissioner Judy Monroe attended Fridays opening of Indianas first breast milk depot at a Women, Infants and Children office in Bloomington. She said similar depots will open next year at three other WIC offices in Indiana.
Women visiting such depots can donate pumped breast milk that will be given to Indiana Mothers Milk Bank in Indianapolis, one of 10 such banks in the United States.
The bank provides screened, pasteurized breast milk to infants who are unable to receive milk from their own mothers. Breast milk contains nutrients researchers say can spur a childs physical and mental growth and which are not found in cow milk-derived formula.
Making breast milk more readily available through these milk depots will result in healthier babies and can save the state millions of dollars, Monroe said.
Rebecca Shaffer, a Hagerstown mother of three boys, has been donating breast milk for the past five months. During that time, shes pumped, frozen and shipped more than 11 gallons of breast milk to the facility, established in August 2005.
My husband lovingly refers to me as the dairy queen, she said, holding 7-month-old son Grant in her arms. Im nursing Grant, but Im just blessed with a lot of excess milk.
Shaffer pumps milk for about half an hour every morning and freezes it in sterile 4-ounce jars provided by the milk bank. Every six weeks, she loads the bottles into her car and drives an hour to the milk bank in Indianapolis.
Monroe said Bloomingtons milk depot, and other depots scheduled to open next year, will help Indiana achieve the goals of a state breast-feeding plan created last year by a task force.
By 2010, we hope to have 75 percent of the states infants breast-fed when they are discharged from the hospital, she said. Right now, its only 64 percent.
The goals also call for 50 percent of Indianas babies to continue to breast-feed for six months, and 15 percent to breast-feed for one year.
Mary Alexander, executive director of Indiana Mothers Milk Bank, said the ideal donor is a mother who has excess milk and a young infant. Donors are not paid for their milk.
God bless these donors and thank God for "the milk of human kindness."
Thought you might be interested...
This is the kind of job I want. Milker at the breast milk depot.
I volunteer to operate the "pumps"!
~chuckling~ I hope the collection place is in the middle of a mall :~)
Seriously... this sounds terrific.
THIS IS MY BREAST PUMP,
THERE ARE MANY LIKE IT BUT THIS ONE IS MINE.
MY BREAST PUMP IS MY BEST FRIEND.
IT IS MY LIFE. I MUST MASTER IT AS I MASTER MY LIFE...
I'd like to apply for a job in receiving.
I heard this guy was first to sign up to operate the pumps.
we were so poor my mom had powdered milk in her boobies
Just wondering...does pasteurization kill antibodies in mother's milk? After all, isn't that what makes mother's milk so superior to formula?
This will save lives - more than many understand. Intestinal necrosis might be entirely avoided in premature infants if breast milk is used.
May God bless the effort, and save these little children...
More convienent than the old fashioned wet-nurse, but not much different.
Seems the old ways aren't so out of date after all.
If I'm correct,what's the deal here?
(Very, very old)
What makes mother's milk superior to formula?
1. It's always fresh.
2. The cats can't get at it.
3. It comes in such a cute little container.
;^)
Lactation Station!
Just how many woman can't breastfeed and why?
I would love to see tim the tool man taylors binford breast pump 5000 look like
LOL!
Where are the pedals?
Breast milk contains nutrients researchers say can spur a childs physical and mental growth and which are not found in cow milk-derived formula.
Antibodies are not classified as nutrients. Therefore, there are other things in milk that I guess do withstand pasteurization and provide an advantage over fortified cow's milk.
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