Tools for Medical Professionals

This list is assembled by medical professionals that live and work in North Carolina. We would love your input. Do you find the following resources helpful?  What other resource might be helpful? Please email durham@breastfeedingcommunities.org and let us know what you think.

Health care within the community must be breastfeeding friendly if a community is to support breastfeeding. Research confirms that comprehensive breastfeeding support in prenatal, maternity, and postnatal care results in improved breastfeeding success.

Evidence-Based Support/Education 

Medications 

  • Drugs and Lactation Database, LactMed (National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine Book Shelf) The LactMed® database contains information on drugs and other chemicals to which breastfeeding mothers may be exposed. It includes information on the levels of such substances in breast milk and infant blood, and the possible adverse effects in the nursing infant. Suggested therapeutic alternatives to those drugs are provided, where appropriate. All data are derived from the scientific literature and fully referenced. A peer review panel reviews the data to assure scientific validity and currency.
  • Infant Risk Center: Breastfeeding (Dr. Tom Hale’s site) Each year millions of pregnant and breastfeeding mothers use medications for an enormous variety of conditions and diseases. Many times – in fact most times – we may not know a lot about the use of these drugs in pregnancy or in breastfeeding. The InfantRisk Center is going to initiate a major program to discover the impact of using medications during pregnancy and during breastfeeding.
  • Mother to Baby (meds during pregnancy and breastfeeding), a service of the non-profit Organization of Teratology Information Specialists, is dedicated to providing evidence-based information to mothers, health care professionals, and the general public about medications and other exposures during pregnancy and while breastfeeding. Talk directly to the experts behind the most up-to-date research.

Handouts

Inducing Lactation and Relactation

Study

Please contact us with any feedback or questions.