Question

You are the registered nurse performing a health assessment on a newborn infant. From the functional health pattern portion of the assessment, you learn the mother is reluctant to breastfeed her baby. How do you respond? Explain the approach you will take to ensure adequate nutrition for the newborn, with or without breastfeeding. Provide rationale for your answer.

Your individual response should have a 1. minimum of 300 words excluding your reference citation 2. need to use two peer-reviewed/scholarly resources to support your response 3. at least one in-intext citation

Answer 1

Breastfeeding is still considered to be best nutrient for a newborn during his/her initial stage of life. It is an art which has to be learned by both mother and newborn. But it has been seen that many mothers are reluctant to breastfeed their children. This is mainly due to the lack of knowledge, embarassment, poor family and social suppot, social norms and certain lactation problems. In the above scenario where mother is reluctant to feed her baby, based on the functional heath pattern of assessment, as a nurse its important to identify the perception of the mother regarding breastfeeding and the role relationship in the family. It is important to find the reason why the mother is reluctant to breastfeed her child. Once the reason is identified then adequate intervention can be planned.

• Provide adequate knowledge about the importance of breastfeeding, the techniques how to breastfeed, and myths regardings breastfeeding.
• A strong family and social support is important to help her adjust to the new lifestyle and physical changes.
• If the mother is still reluctant then atleast she should be encouraged to adopt the alternative method of expressed milk. This will continue to give adequate nutrition to the newborn even if not breastfed. The expressed milk technique is to offer manually removed milk to the child. This technique is also help for mothers with breast sore, inverted nipples etc.
• Alternative methods to breastfeed like use of breast pumps to manage the lactational problems should be explained.
• Proper positioning of child during breastfeeding should be demonstrated to help mother to adapt this technique easily.
• Use of infant formula in mothers with no milk or not willing to breastfeed is another option. This formula provide adequate nutrients to the newborn required for their growth and development.
• Cup feeding can be used for premature children with cleft lip and palate.
• Finger feeding induces baby's reflex for sucking.

References:

1. Nemours Kids health, Breastfeeding vs. Formula feeding
2. Breastfeeding-problem.com, Alternatives to breast feeding.
3. NCBI sources, Rockville(MD): The Surgeon's general call to support breastfeeding.
4. Ruth Lawerence, Robert Lawerence, Breastfeeding- A guide for medical profession, 8th edition, 26 October 2015.
5. Remy Melina, Live science (2010), "Why would moms not want to breastfeed?"