In My Opinion

If you haven't seen the ABC News segment with Selma Hayek in Sierra Leone, then follow THIS LINK and watch the video clip then come back here to read on.

Some facts from the story include Selma's humanitarian trip to Sierra Leone with a push towards erradicating neonatal tetanus, which is often transmitted via an infected umbilical cord stump. Protection from neonatal tetanus can come by sterile birth practices or via a maternal tetanus toxoid immunization during pregnancy. This latter method is what is being focused on here and by Unicef and Pampers. The two organizations have joined together to make tetanus vaccines available to women in need in developing countries.

Some points of controversy with the story:

During the nightline video, an infant is shown taking its last breath, dying from tetanus. The actual death is shown. Secondly, Selma, who is still lactating, breastfeeds a hungry african infant on camera.

Some of my admittedly random thoughts on the story.

It is enlightening to those of us in the developed world to hear of such easily preventable tragedies. Never would we think of packing an umbilical cord with manure or mud....as is done in Africa and other such developing countries, contributing to this horrible death for the infants. Yes, a simple, cheap vaccine can potentially save many babies from needless death. And, think what could be accomplished with the education of those women, teaching the importance of a clean environment for childbirth. It does inspire us to give to help reach the helpless babies in time.

However, I'm not so thrilled with the idea of pamper's "help" being tied to America's commercialism. "If you buy 1 pack of pampers; we will deliver 1 tetanus vaccine." Hmmm, not so heart felt, it would seem.

Secondly, I take offense to the airing of the infant's death on national media. Was consent to air the child's dying breath given by the baby's mother? If so, did she truly understand that it would be plastered across the internet and aired nationally on Nightline? Even if she did consent, is it humane? Is it necessary to make the point? Are we sensationalized enough to expect to see a dying baby in a journalism piece on dying babies in Africa? In my opinion, it was senseless, needless and in poor taste.

Lastly, I have issues with Selma's breastfeeding the infant who was not hers. I am not disputing the fact that breastmilk is superior food for all babies, especially babies living in such plain disadvantage as those on the piece in Sierra Leone. I am just .... shall we say concerned about the details of the act. Was the mother of the infant alive? Did she give consent for the infant to breastfeed? Was Selma medically screened at all? In light of the subject matter, compared to dying of tetanus, contracting an illness from Selma's milk is probably a mute point. However, breastmilk has been shown to transmit such diseases as HIV and Hepatitis.

And, there are established human milk banks designed to do just such screening on donor human milk, which is then made available to those in need. This program is small and in need of promotion and expansion, for sure. Perhaps selma could put her celebrity power behind this established method for the safe distribution of breastmilk instead of randomly picking up a hungry infant and so genersously allowing it to suckle, as was portrayed in this piece.

Again, my thoughts are random. What are your thoughts? I do think that the issue is important.

Should Americans help with the shortage of funds available to vaccinate pregnant women in Sierra Leone? Yes.

Should we go a step further and strive to improve the unsanitary conditions newborns are exposed to? Certainly.

Would it be beneficial for all babies - everywhere - to breastfeed? Absolutely.

Does this journalism piece do justice to any of these issues? In my opinion, No.

New Starts

Today I'm starting my Spring Semester of courses. With only one semester after this one, I'm pretty excited to get started and get done.

And

Yesterday we found out we are starting down the "orthodontic's road of no return." Little Lance needs orthodontic work. His two incisors are impacted necessitating early orthodontic intervention in order to avoid surgery (the incisors are the teeth on either side of the 2 front teeth - his are not coming down). So, we'll start with the expander - which sounds absolutely BARBARIC to me... They put this metal contraption on his upper back teeth and each night Mark or I (READ: MARK) will have to crank it further apart to literally stretch his upper palate wider... Amazingly enough, though, his palate actually splits cells and new cells are made and new bone grows to fill in the stretched space.... Pretty gruesome... if you ask me... Gruesome but interesting - if it weren't my little 8 year old going through it!
Then we'll go to temporary braces, then a full set.

The whole process time wise will be a few years..... Price wise: you don't even want to know!! But, we're getting his teeth ready for the most important picture of his life: his wedding picture.. That's our inspiration... A long road but worth it in the end.

Interestingly, studies show that breastfed babies' palates are more perfectly formed because of the breastfeeding's natural physiological spreading of the palate by the breast tissue..... And, Lance was my longest breastfeeder at 1 and a half years.... I wonder if it would have been worse had he not breastfed?

Fun New Site

I just found a new site (hooray, for days off). It is called Wordle. You go and type in text and it makes a neat creation using the words you type in.

I used a poem I wrote years ago about breastfeeding and the results are kinda neat.

Here it is in "Wordle Mode" (click on it to see it bigger)



And, Here it is in the original format:

"My Best"
As the moons pass month after month
My belly and breasts swell …
Fuller and Rounder - radiating the glow of life within.

I admire the wonders of my womanly body as
My sensuous curves turn motherly
My motherly curves remain sensuous.

Finally, My day arrives.
The day woman becomes mother.

I'm frightened by the surge of energy that comes from a place deep within me I have never known before.
I need comforting,
I need support,
I need a wise woman - a mother to guide me.

As she stands motionless, I sense her presence.
She whispers for me to be strong,
To fully embrace my rite of passage.
To unite with other birthing women around the world who are also laboring with me.

Then, as the wind blows softly through my window it surrounds my body and holds me.
I feel the strength from the women of the world embrace me.

I now welcome the tremendous waves of energy my body produces.
Wave after wave after wave
My body works perfectly to birth my child.

And then, my hand reaches out and touches the unreal, the dreamed of, the perfect head of my precious child.
My baby is entering the world.
This world
So Kind and Cruel
So Joyful and Sorrowful
So Beautiful and Ugly
This is the world I have to offer my child

I vow to provide the best for my precious babe.
I will shelter, protect and nurture this gift from God.

I now offer my breast.
Full and round from months of anticipation.
Naked and ready for my babe's strong suck
I offer my breast.
I offer my best.

Being the Change

I love the quote from Gandhi:
"You must be the change you wish to see in the world."

Because I've chosen to take the "Change the system from within" route of gentle birth advocacy, the change will be slow in coming. I am aware of that.

When midwifery services are few and far between and when the existing ones that are available to the communities around us are facing challenges and some are closing, it is at times disheartening.

My part of birth change will be especially slow in coming. It took me four years to complete one step in my path in becoming an RN. Now gaining experience and respect from my co-workers is my focus before I can move on to other levels.

Because most of my time so far has focused mainly on learning the ropes of the new hospital and becoming proficient at clinical tasks, I haven't made many strides forward in promoting gentle birth and peaceful postpartums. However, for the first time - just this past week, I felt like I was able to be of some help to a woman in a real way.

The secretary couldn't find the nurse assigned to this particular mom and just announced to those of us who happened to be in the nursing station that mom in Room # such - n - such was asking for a nurse to bring a bottle into her. Since I was up to date on my charting and my patient's needs were already met, I said I could do that.

Not knowing anything about this patient, I walked into her room and asked her what type of formula her baby needed. That's when she broke down. She continued to cry and tell me how she couldn't get her baby to latch on and that the doctor just came in and told her her baby's bilirubin levels were too high, necessitating bili-blanket therapy.

(If you aren't familiar with hyperbilirubinemia, it is basically jaundice because of excess broken down RBC's in the infant's system. It is usually benign and clears up as the baby takes in adequate protein - from milk - which binds to the unconjugated bilirubin and aids in its excretion from the body).

At the core of the jaundice problem is milk intake. This combined with the first time mom's inability to get her newborn to latch was all this poor woman needed to push her over the edge. She needed kind, support from an experienced mother - in this case a mother who also happened to be a nurse.

So, we worked on the problem together. And, after many tricks and tries, we got a successful nursing session out of the couplet! I made it a point to tell her several good things I observed that would contribute to their successful nursing relationship. Like her having good "nursing nipples" and the baby being big and able to suck strongly.

She left later that afternoon with her nursing relationship growing with a good foundation.

I was blessed to have been around when she called out to the nursing station that day. What a rewarding experience among the challenges of orientation....a time when I feel all I'm doing is learning - it was nice to be able to do some teaching and helping, too.