Many Ob-Gyn Textbooks Lack Good Info on Breast-Feeding

Another text also omitted a discussion of the inadvisability of supplementing mothers' milk with formula within the first 48 to 72 hours after delivery, Ogburn added. Suckling is crucial in this postnatal period to stimulate the mother's breast milk. Meanwhile, nursing infants receive colostrum (especially healthy "first" or "immune" milk) from the mother's breast. Colostrum passes on the mother's immunity to the baby and protects it in the first month of life, Ogburn explained. He added that mothers who supplement breast-feeding with formula during the first 72 hours are less likely to breast-feed later.

Aponte agreed that standard medical text books should address breast-feeding more thoroughly. "Textbooks are so academic and so focused on the academic portion of medicine," he explained. "This is sort of softer, this is less scientific."

Dr. Ruth Lawrence, a professor of pediatrics at the University of Rochester who authored the breast-feeding section in one of the praised texts, said she and others have been trying for a number of years to increase the number of physicians who are well-informed about breast-feeding.

"Everybody knows that breast-feeding is good," she said. "But not everybody knows how to help mother succeed."

The federal government's Healthy People 2010 goals and a policy statement from the American Academy of Pediatrics recommend exclusive breast-feeding for the first six months, Ogburn said. Healthy People 2010 has set a goal for 50 percent of mothers to be nursing when their infants are six months old, compared with the 29 percent reported in 1998.

The benefits of breast-feeding for the child range from fewer upper respiratory infections to better bonding and lower rates of diabetes, Ogburn noted. And the American Academy of Pediatrics says that benefits to the mother include an earlier return to pre-pregnancy weight and a decreased risk of breast and ovarian cancer.

More information

Find out more about breast-feeding at the American Academy of Pediatrics.

SOURCES: Adam Aponte, M.D., medical director, North General Diagnostic and Treatment Center, and chair of pediatrics and ambulatory Care, North General Hospital, New York, N.Y.; Ruth Lawrence, M.D., professor, pediatrics, University of Rochester School of Medicine, Rochester, N.Y.; Tony Ogburn, M.D., associate professor and residency program director, department of obstetrics and gynecology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque; presentation, May 5, 2008, American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists, annual meeting, New Orleans