NATIONWIDE — A sweeping campaign to identify ways to encourage breastfeeding has concluded that existing efforts place too much emphasis on individual breastfeeding duration and not enough on the many outside factors that determine breastfeeding success.
Doctors consider breastfeeding ideal for the health of infants and mothers alike, but for some moms, breastfeeding can be difficult or impossible. To find ways to support parents through the breastfeeding process, the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine (ABM) and Reaching our Sisters Everywhere (ROSE) brought together families, community members, health care workers and researchers to explore the challenges associated with breastfeeding and identify ways to overcome them.
The results, published in the scientific journal Breastfeeding Medicine, provide important insights into the difficulties many parents face. Participants described how they often felt social pressure to give their babies formula rather than breast milk, even though all major medical groups recommend exclusive breastfeeding for the first six months.
Many participants talked about how they felt poorly prepared for the difficulties they would face when breastfeeding. Some described impersonal care from health care workers and lack of support from family members.
The findings will guide future breastfeeding initiatives and reveal where additional study is most needed, said researcher Ann Kellams, M.D., a breastfeeding expert at UVA Health.
“It doesn’t help anyone to say you should breastfeed and then not have the support and evidence-based best care that we know helps families reach their infant feeding goal,” said Kellams, a pediatrician and breastfeeding and lactation medicine specialist. “In this study, we asked the breastfeeding person themselves what is important to them, what they need in order to be successful.”
Breastfeeding challenges
The ABM partnered with ROSE specifically to engage with non-Hispanic Black women, a group that has the lowest rates of breastfeeding in the United States. ROSE conducted virtual town halls in Virginia, Maryland and Washington, D.C. The researchers also performed outreach to other groups, including conducting an online survey shared widely through social media and electronic mailing lists for parents and lactation-support providers.
In the short term, Kellams says, the feedback will be invaluable for health care workers seeking to encourage breastfeeding. But it also offers a critical roadmap for future breastfeeding initiatives and research, so that such efforts reflect parents’ wants and needs.
For example, the results suggest that there is significant demand for more study of the effectiveness of different approaches to managing common breastfeeding problems such as pain and limited milk supply.
“We hope to take what we have learned from families and translate that into effective interventions,” Kellams said. “Breastfeeding is a ‘team sport,’ and whether you are a healthcare professional, family member, friend or community member, we are all on the team. In order for us to have healthier lives on a large scale, we all need to do our part to support breastfeeding success.”