NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - Most employees have positive views of workplace policies that help women keep up breastfeeding after they return to the job, a new study suggests.
Researchers found that among 407 employees at a large U.S. corporation, most looked favorably on such accommodations -- including giving women a designated area to breastfeed or pump breast milk during the work day, or covering lactation services under the employee health plan.
The findings, while based on only one company, suggest that "a corporate environment designed to enable and encourage continued breastfeeding does not endanger positive attitudes toward breastfeeding in other employees," the researchers report in the International Breastfeeding Journal.
For the study, researchers led by Kathryn Suyes of the Virginia Department of Health in Richmond used an online survey to gauge breastfeeding experiences and attitudes of employees at a large corporation with "family-friendly" policies.
Those policies included services like on-site daycare, flexible work schedules and paid family medical leave.
The survey asked workers to rate the extent to which they agreed or disagreed with various statements on workplace breastfeeding policies -- such as "Allowing women to breastfeed in the workplace will interfere with productivity," and "Allowing women to breastfeed in the workplace will decrease absenteeism."
Overall, the researchers found, 40 percent of the workers said they or a spouse had breastfed at some point during their time with the company; 76 percent said they knew at least one co-worker who had used a breast pump or breastfed during the work day.
And on average, employees held positive views on workplace breastfeeding accommodations -- typically agreeing that the policies attracted job candidates and kept current employees happy, and disagreeing with the idea that they harmed productivity.
Employees who knew a co-worker who'd breastfed or used a breast pump at work were particularly likely to favor such policies.
The results, according to Suyes and her colleagues, suggest that most employees do not react negatively when they see a breastfeeding co-worker receive "special services."
However, they add, given that the findings come from one corporation, it's not clear whether the same attitudes would be seen at other companies or across industries.
SOURCE: International Breastfeeding Journal, October 20, 2008.
Sunday, November 2, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
Six?! Yikes!
Woman in Berlin gives birth to sextuplets
Mon Oct 20, 2008 7:08pm BST
BERLIN (Reuters) - A woman who had been struggling to conceive ended up giving birth to six healthy babies in a German hospital, the medical director of Berlin's Charite hospital said Monday.
Ulrich Frei said the woman had given birth to four boys and two girls -- each weighing between 800 and 900 grams (about 2 pounds) -- after 27 weeks of gestation Thursday.
The woman had undergone a standard fertility treatment after unsuccessful attempts to become pregnant, Wolfgang Henrich, a doctor who assisted the delivery, told a news conference. He said it had been an unproblematic caesarean birth.
The hospital declined to give further details about the woman.
Charite, one of Germany's leading hospitals, is 300 years old and Frei said sextuplets had never been born there before. The odds of having sextuplets is one in four billion, according to media reports.
In Germany, the survival rate of infants weighing less than 1000 grams at birth is nearly 90 percent, according to Monika Berns -- director of the hospital's neonatology department.
In August, an Iraqi woman gave birth to sextuplets, but two of them died at birth due to the hospital's lack of proper medical equipment.
The first sextuplets known to have survived their infancy were born to a South African couple in January 1974.
Mon Oct 20, 2008 7:08pm BST
BERLIN (Reuters) - A woman who had been struggling to conceive ended up giving birth to six healthy babies in a German hospital, the medical director of Berlin's Charite hospital said Monday.
Ulrich Frei said the woman had given birth to four boys and two girls -- each weighing between 800 and 900 grams (about 2 pounds) -- after 27 weeks of gestation Thursday.
The woman had undergone a standard fertility treatment after unsuccessful attempts to become pregnant, Wolfgang Henrich, a doctor who assisted the delivery, told a news conference. He said it had been an unproblematic caesarean birth.
The hospital declined to give further details about the woman.
Charite, one of Germany's leading hospitals, is 300 years old and Frei said sextuplets had never been born there before. The odds of having sextuplets is one in four billion, according to media reports.
In Germany, the survival rate of infants weighing less than 1000 grams at birth is nearly 90 percent, according to Monika Berns -- director of the hospital's neonatology department.
In August, an Iraqi woman gave birth to sextuplets, but two of them died at birth due to the hospital's lack of proper medical equipment.
The first sextuplets known to have survived their infancy were born to a South African couple in January 1974.
Tuesday, October 14, 2008
Not my favorite celeb. but interesting...
Jolie breast-feeding photo: triumph or trouble?
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A magazine cover photo of Angelina Jolie breast-feeding one of her newborn twins may have turned the superstar actress into a role model for new mothers.
The photo, taken by Jolie's partner Brad Pitt, will adorn the November issue of W magazine. Other family pictures taken by Pitt in the weeks after the birth in July of twins Vivienne Marcheline and Leon Knox will appear inside.
"I think it is fabulous. Seeing a celebrity like Angelina Jolie breast-feed can be a role model to encourage women to make a choice that is wonderful for their baby," said Andi Silverman, mom of two and author of "Mama Knows Breast."
"Breasts are used to sell all sorts of products, so to see them used the way nature intended can only be a great thing," Silverman told Reuters.
But while breast-feeding support groups and moms celebrated Jolie's public statement, one expert said the picture felt like voyeurism, especially given Jolie's sex symbol status in movies like "Wanted" and "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider".
About 70 percent of American mothers breast-feed their newborns but the rate falls dramatically after six months, according to official figures.
Jolie, 33, is not the first celebrity to be photographed nursing her baby. Model Jerry Hall appeared on the pages of Vanity Fair in 1991 breast-feeding Gabriel, her son with Mick Jagger.
But that was a generation ago, and Jolie's global influence as a style-setter and through her humanitarian travels and support of kids in third world countries, ensured the impact of the photo of her special moments with her baby.
1 of 1Full Size"The response from moms we have seen is that if someone as popular, beautiful and together as Angelina is breast-feeding her children, it inspires other women to do so themselves," said Dr Shannon Fox, a psychotherapist with the www.Momlogic.com website.
Little is seen in the picture of the act of breast-feeding. It shows Jolie smiling, while a tiny hand is just visible at bottom of the frame.
But Fox said the cover photo sends a second message.
"The problem is that she is also an international sex symbol. So whether or not she says 'This is a beautiful way of nurturing my baby', every man who sees that photo will see those breasts as sexual."
La Leche League International, the world's oldest breast-feeding support organization, said the photo was particularly welcome as Jolie has twins.
"Mothers of twins report it takes a lot of time, effort and physical energy to breast-feed. I think the picture is beautiful," said La Leche League International spokeswoman Jane Krouse.
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - A magazine cover photo of Angelina Jolie breast-feeding one of her newborn twins may have turned the superstar actress into a role model for new mothers.
The photo, taken by Jolie's partner Brad Pitt, will adorn the November issue of W magazine. Other family pictures taken by Pitt in the weeks after the birth in July of twins Vivienne Marcheline and Leon Knox will appear inside.
"I think it is fabulous. Seeing a celebrity like Angelina Jolie breast-feed can be a role model to encourage women to make a choice that is wonderful for their baby," said Andi Silverman, mom of two and author of "Mama Knows Breast."
"Breasts are used to sell all sorts of products, so to see them used the way nature intended can only be a great thing," Silverman told Reuters.
But while breast-feeding support groups and moms celebrated Jolie's public statement, one expert said the picture felt like voyeurism, especially given Jolie's sex symbol status in movies like "Wanted" and "Lara Croft: Tomb Raider".
About 70 percent of American mothers breast-feed their newborns but the rate falls dramatically after six months, according to official figures.
Jolie, 33, is not the first celebrity to be photographed nursing her baby. Model Jerry Hall appeared on the pages of Vanity Fair in 1991 breast-feeding Gabriel, her son with Mick Jagger.
But that was a generation ago, and Jolie's global influence as a style-setter and through her humanitarian travels and support of kids in third world countries, ensured the impact of the photo of her special moments with her baby.
1 of 1Full Size"The response from moms we have seen is that if someone as popular, beautiful and together as Angelina is breast-feeding her children, it inspires other women to do so themselves," said Dr Shannon Fox, a psychotherapist with the www.Momlogic.com website.
Little is seen in the picture of the act of breast-feeding. It shows Jolie smiling, while a tiny hand is just visible at bottom of the frame.
But Fox said the cover photo sends a second message.
"The problem is that she is also an international sex symbol. So whether or not she says 'This is a beautiful way of nurturing my baby', every man who sees that photo will see those breasts as sexual."
La Leche League International, the world's oldest breast-feeding support organization, said the photo was particularly welcome as Jolie has twins.
"Mothers of twins report it takes a lot of time, effort and physical energy to breast-feed. I think the picture is beautiful," said La Leche League International spokeswoman Jane Krouse.
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
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