Breast Milk Bank

I was just watching on the news about a new Breast Milk Bank which has opened at the King Edward Memorial Hospital for Women in Perth.

I was amazed by this because I know back in the day mothers with an overload of milk used to be able to donate their excess breast milk to premmie babies and this was stopped due to the AID's virus etc.

Well apparently technology has been developed to "pasterise" and "perfect" the BM for premmie's needs (such as added vitamins and the extra exta protein needs of very premmie babies).

I think this is wonderful! It's also screened and screened again for any bacteria/infection. It's the first one in Australia and the medical profession are hoping to make this facility Australia-wide.

[stephwhiz]

GEE--I'll have to think on that one. I mean as long as they are 100% sure there could be no diseases in the milk then I say it's a good thing. But otherwise I would be a little leary of it. Stephanie :D

[Kerina]

I'm surprised people don't think twice about drinking cow breast milk, knowing they are given all kinds of garbage like hormones, antibiotics, dead cows mixed in their feed,(they're herbivores) and think another human's milk is weird for their human baby.

I know for safety reasons they have to screen the milk, but it is very very rare to pass on any illness in breastmilk. The whole design of breast milk is to protect the baby from whatever he has been exposed to, which would include anything the mother has.

Mothers have been graciously giving their milk to babies in need forever. I think it is wonderful and would pay for another human's milk if I couldn't breasfeed.

It would really depend on the cost for us. I mean you can buy a tin of formula that lasts 3 or so days for a newborn (if I remember correctly from last time LOL) for less than $13.00 here in NZ. So about $26.00 a week. How much would they charge for the bm since they would be spending quite a bit of money on all the screening etc of it?

I would use another womens bm for Sophie as long as I know that she isn't taking drugs or smoking or drinking. And of course that she doesn't have AIDS or something like that...
Yeah we don't know what exactly is in cows milk but I'm pretty sure they don't give them drugs eg LSD, Pot etc... or give them cigarettes to smoke on or give them alcohol [rofl]
Sorry just the image of a cow smoking on a cigarette made me laugh! :lol:

[danou]

this idea of a bm bank makes so much sense to me... it would seem to my un-learned opinion that a premie would do better on breast milk or be a more likely candidate for needing bm.

I am assuming that pasturisation process doesn't knock off all the good things about breast milk.

[kanaclark]

I'm all for the milk banks, I just wish it wasn't so expensive for moms and dad's who use it. I got this from breastfeeding.com and have seen even higher quotes elsewhere, the link is below also, so you can read the page.

How Much Does it Cost?

Milk banks charge a fee to help offset the cost of processing donor breastmilk (the fee only covers about 60% of the cost). The Mothers' Milk Bank of Denver, Colorado charges $2.25/ounce plus $0.25/ounce if shipped. Other milk banks may charge somewhat different fees.

Donor milk from a milk bank is covered by some medical insurance policies. (If you control which insurance plan your company uses, here's a good question to ask them!) WIC clients are eligible for coverage, and no baby is refused for inability to pay.


http://www.breastfeeding.com/all_about/all_about_milk_banks.html

As far as I know the milk bank is part and parcel of the care of Premmies at the Women's hospital - so no one pays for it.

No they don't knock off the goodness when they pasterise it according to them and they also add a few more in because of the high protien needs of a premmie.

I wouldn't even be concerned about the worry of diseases because they certainly would not be taking milk from mothers known to have diseases that could concern others.

And I agree about the cows milk issue that is why we buy our milk from a company who only feed their cows on grass/grain and it tastes delicious.
It's actually illegal to put hormones in cows and chickens in Australia and has been since the 30's, however it is also illegal to sell meat products without antibiotics due to the bacterium belonging to animals.

We also buy meat from grain fed and grass fed cattle and it tastes a whole lot different to the gross stuff they sell in supermarkets!

If you don't have to pay for the bm then that's great! :D An ounce isn't much is it? How many ounces of milk does a newborn baby drink in a week?

[Kensbev]

Interesting that this should come up... I made excess milk with my first child. (I had to pump about 16 ounces a day to stay comfortable and avoid plugged ducts/mastitis.) I contacted the lactation consultant at our local hospital to see if she could hook me up with a milk bank, but she never got back to me.

When I stopped breastfeeding Audrey, it was partially due to the doctor's recommendation that she go on whole cow's milk, since she was such a skinny thing. I had been planning to feed her my pumped BM and had over 1,000 ounces in the deep freeze!

This time around, I was complaining to a friend about my over-production. I hadn't really talked about it before with her, and I really regret that now. Her uncle is involved with the HMBANA http://www.hmbana.org/ in Colorado. She gave me all the info for the nearest milk bank, and after a very rigorous testing, I was approved as a donor. (I had to get approval from my doctor and my pediatrician, plus have my blood drawn and shipped to them to test for HIV, Hepatitus, etc. before they would take my milk.)

Now that I'm an approved donor, the floodgates have burst, lol! I pump once in the morning after Tory's had breakfast, once in the afternoon if I remember to, and right before bedtime. If I miss a pump, I will live to regret it, because all this pumping is stimulating my production. With Audrey, I didn't encourage the oversupply, so it stayed at around 16 ounces per day. Now that I'm encouraging it, I pump anywhere between 24-28 ounces per day. I've already sent in about 1,200 ounces since Tory was born, and I feel so blessed that I'm able to do this.

Reading a letter on my local milk bank's website convinced me that this isn't a curse, which is what I thought every time I got a plugged duct or mastitis the first time around. It's a gift from God, I believe that He wants me to help others with it. The letter was from the husband of a woman who had died giving birth to their daughter prematurely, thanking all the donors for our gift. Donated breastmilk helped that child fight for her life. God is using me to help others, and I want to cry when I think about how much more good I could have done if I'd known with Audrey.

As a bonus to all of this, I eat like an absolute pig right now, and I can still fit into my pre-pregnancy clothes. :D Imagine how skinny I'd be if I didn't eat all that ice cream, lol!

[Cristina]

I think milk banks are awsome! I got off to a horrible start with breastfeeding (that's a whole other bedtime story), and gave up because ds would never even try to latch and I could never pump more than 10oz per day :cry: . I wanted to use donor milk, but unfortunately it cost nearly $4/oz here, and even though we have great insurance they wouldn't help defray the cost unless ds was sickly or failing to thrive. I hope in the future that it can be more affordable for the average family, and if I am blessed with an over-supply with my next babe then I will gladly donate!

[BlessedMommy]

Breast milk banks sound great. How do you go about becoming a donor? And do they supply you with a pump? I can never imagine pumping that much bm with my manual pump.

[luvmy4sons]

In the old days you simply got a "wet nurse". In the south the black slaves actually nursed the white plantation owners' children as it was too tiring and bothersome for the mistress of the plantation to do so herself. Obviously, each mother feeding their own child with her own breast milk is, but it is good that there are other options besides cow's milk, which is meant for a baby cow, not a baby human! :D

Breast milk banks sound great. How do you go about becoming a donor? And do they supply you with a pump? I can never imagine pumping that much bm with my manual pump.

What kind of pump do you have? I have two manuals. One Medela and one Avent Isis. I could pump 100mls in like 10 minutes with the Medela and the Avent Isis is better so if I had enough milk still I'd guess I could pump 100mls in 5 minutes with the Avent one.
I love the Avent Isis. You can use it one handed and it feels just like baby is suckling. It's so comfortable to use.