Short-term efficacy of two breast pumps and impact on breastfeeding outcomes at 6 months in exclusively breastfeeding mothers: A randomised trial.

The provision of breast pumps is a potential strategy to increase breastfeeding duration. This trial compared the effectiveness and acceptability of two breast pumps in mothers exclusively breastfeeding (EBF) their healthy term infant. It also tested whether provision of pumps versus vouchers of equivalent value influenced breastfeeding or attainment of mothers' goals at 3 and 6 months.

Breastmilk cultures and infection in extremely premature infants.

Objective: As expressed mother's milk (MM) is known to be colonized by microbial species, it is occasionally considered as a source of infection in premature infants, prompting some clinicians to obtain milk bacterial culture results before infant feeding. To determine whether serial microbial cultures of MM predict infection in premature infants.

Study Design: Milk microbial flora was determined by plate counts from aliquots of MM obtained from 161 mothers of infants born <30 weeks gestation (n = 209).

Outcomes of human milk-fed premature infants.

Significant benefits to infant host defense, sensory-neural development, gastrointestinal maturation, and some aspects of nutritional status are observed when premature infants are fed their mothers' own milk. A reduction in infection-related morbidity in human milk-fed premature infants has been reported in nearly a dozen descriptive, and a few quasi-randomized, studies in the past 25 years. Human milk-fed infants also have decreased rates of rehospitalization for illness after discharge.