[Southsider2k12]

http://www.insideindianabusiness.com/newsitem.asp?ID=22602

Breast Milk Depot Opens in LaPorte County
InsideINdianaBusiness.com Report

4/3/2007 11:12:22 AM

The state's second breast milk depot opened today at the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) office in Michigan City. The depot allows women to donate pumped breast milk to the Indiana Mothers’ Milk Bank. The first depot opened last October in Bloomington and future locations are being planned for Delaware and Tippecanoe Counties.

Source: Inside INdiana Business





Media Advisory

Michigan City, Ind. -

EVENT: News Conference to Celebrate the Opening of First Breast Milk Depot in Michigan City, IN

DATE: Tuesday, April 3, 2007

TIME: 10 a.m. (Central Time)/ 11 a.m. (Eastern Standard Time)

LOCATION: Woman, Infants and Children (WIC) Office, Conference Room
301 E. 8th Street, IN
Michigan City, IN

DETAILS:

In honor of National Public Health Awareness Week, the Indiana Mother’s Milk Bank is partnering with the Women, Infants and Children (WIC) Program at the State Department of Health to launch the opening of a breast milk depot at the WIC office in Michigan City, IN.

The theme of this year’s National Public Health Awareness Week is Disaster Preparedness. For this theme, the Indiana Mother’s Milk Bank is inviting Kristen Garcia, Field Public Information Officer for the State Department of Health, to speak on the importance of breastfeeding and storing breast milk for disaster response and preparedness. Garcia will also share personal insights from her experience as a nursing mother.

The opening of the breast milk depot in Michigan City is part of the State Department of Health’s plan in partnering with the Indiana Mothers’ Milk Bank to establish milk depots at select WIC offices around the state. These milk depots will provide a location for women to donate pumped breast milk to the Indiana Mothers’ Milk Bank. Indiana’s first breast milk depot was opened last October in Bloomington. Delaware and Tippecanoe counties will also receive breast milk depots sometime this year.

Donors will deliver pumped milk to the WIC milk depot, where it will be held in a freezer until it is transported to the Milk Bank. WIC will be responsible for logging in donations, monitoring freezer temperature, and shipping donations to the Milk Bank.

The Indiana Mothers’ Milk Bank was launched with the support of the Methodist Health Foundation, which provided a start-up grant of $200,000. Since the opening, the Milk Bank has received financial support from the Nina Mason Pulliam Charitable Trust, Junior League of Indianapolis, Clarian Health Partners, RGK Foundation and the Lorena Fund (a fund of the Central Indiana Community Foundation).

Source: Clarin Health

[Ang]

Do they give the donated breast milk to babies? I'm sorry, but to me that's just gross. I realize that breast milk is the best thing for a baby, but I have a problem with someone else's breast milk. You don't know what's in that stuff.

[Tim]

Think they'll have Drive Up/Drop Off - like you pull up to a window, they stick something like the bell of a tuba out - and you fire away?

Just a thought.....

[Ang]

Sure, you can donate breast milk without ever having to leave the comfort of your car.

[Max Main]

Is there a plethora of volunteers trying to get some 'action?'

just kidding.


but it does seem odd that mothers would be giving away milk and not using it for their own babies. could someone explain this?

[RedDevilMC]

I know it sounds gross but it has been proven in studies that babies (especially sick babies) thrive and become healthier with breast milk. So this bank is for primarily children at regional medical centers that are in a very bad health situation. Both of my children are breast fed kids (go ahead and laugh or smile) and we had a medical situation with one. She was hospitalized for 21 days. She had an infection that attacked her blood and bones through the chicken pox. Doctors at the University of Florida told us that she was able to fight off the attack because of the breast milk. Sounds crazy but true. Also back in the day, mothers shared the responsibilty of feeding children (sounds disgusting but true) in their families/circle of friends/plantations, etc. My 2 cents.

[Southsider2k12]

The ND has a much more detailed story about this today...

http://www.michigancityin.com/articles/200.../04/news/n2.txt

Mother's milk bank to help needy babies
By Deborah Sederberg, The News-Dispatch

The depot, located at the NECA-IBEW building, is the second in the state.

The new Indiana Mother's Milk Bank Depot in Michigan City won't provide wet nurses, but it will provide the next best thing - milk from nursing mothers willing to donate to sick and needy babies.

The Michigan City depot, based at the WIC office in the NECA-IBEW Building, 301 E. Eighth Ave., will collect donated milk to ship to Indianapolis, where it will be pasteurized and distributed to hospitals and outpatient infants whose physicians prescribe it.

The Michigan City depot was introduced Tuesday by Dr. Kinga Szucs, associate professor of clinical pediatrics at the Indiana University School of Medicine and a member of the board of the Indiana Mothers Milk Bank. She said mother's milk is simply the best food available for human babies.

Breast milk protects against meningitis, pneumonia, diarrhea and a variety of other potentially deadly disease, Szucs said. “Breast-fed babies are less likely to die.”

Sick babies and premature babies are especially in need of breast milk, she said. Some cannot properly absorb commercial formula; others are intolerant of it.

“Mothers of premature or sick infants may need banked milk for a variety of reasons,” explained Mary Alexander, executive director of the Indiana Mothers Bank. “Some may be unable to produce their own milk, may be on medication that precludes breast feeding or may be sick.

“The use of pasteurized donor milk for premature infants has been shown to reduce the incidence of bowel inflammation, sepsis (a blood infection) and infection, resulting in shorter hospital stays.”

Szucs said milk bank personnel are vigilant about the quality and safety of the milk. Donor mothers are carefully screened. “Really, we want donations from mothers who are taking almost no medication,” she said. “We are ultra-conservative” about milk donations.

After mothers are thoroughly screened and tested for diseases, including HIV and hepatitis, the milk is still pasteurized at temperatures (and for time periods) that would kill HIV and other viruses and bacteria.

While live cells are killed by pasteurization, she said, babies do gain immunities. What's more, the fatty acids essential for eye and brain development are untouched by pasteurization.

Donor mothers must have given birth no more than a year ago. That restriction is important, Szucs said. “Breast milk changes to fit the baby's needs,” she added.

Jennifer Carol of Michigan City was at Tuesday's announcement and considered being a donor. But because her son, Finn, is 11 months old, her breast milk may not be suitable for premature babies.

Ideally, mothers would nurse their own babies through age 2, and that mother's milk would be appropriate for a 2-year-old. Premature and sick babies need milk designed for infants.

In fact, milk from mothers whose babies were delivered pre-term is the most valuable of all to premature babies.

Babies are not the only ones who benefit from mother's milk. The milk also provides what certain cancer patients need.

The milk is available through hospital order and through physician prescription, Alexander said. Priced at about $4 per ounce, the milk is covered by some insurance companies, but not all.

The only other milk depot in Indiana is in Bloomington. Indiana is one of just 10 states with milk banks and Michigan City is just the second milk depot in Indiana.

The Methodist Hospital Foundation gave $200,000 to get the milk bank started. For more information, visit the Web site www.immilkbank.org.

Contact reporter Deborah Sederberg at dsederberg@thenewsdispatch.com.

[Max Main]

No question that breast milk is the best way to feed a baby. And by the way, a Wet Nurse is a woman who is lactating that would provide milk for another's baby, frequently for her own at the same time. I think this used to be rather common practice, especially among the so-called upper class.

The antibiotic qualities of breast milk are well-known.

What I found noteworthy was that there would be a big operation like this to provide milk to many chill'un. If they need it, it sounds like a great thing. I would not have thought of it!