breast warmer to help prevent mastitis

[Mum2SweetCs]

Hi Ladies do you have any recommendations for breast warmers to help prevent future mastitis?

The one I'm leaning towards is one from the aba website called breast-warmers

But they are a little dear and postage for one item is still 9.95

Any suggestions?

Thanks

[Barb Glare]

Hi

The ABA breastwarmers are great. BTW, are you a member of ABA yet? They are such an amazing group to be involved in.

The drill for preventing mastitis is - keep moving that milk. The first stage of mastitis is "stasis" - the milk is not moving and the breast becomes engorged. Milk leaks out of the ducts and into the surrounding tissue and sets up an inflammation. Sometimes this makes you feel shivery and achey (like if you had a sprained ankle) Emptying the breast (baby works best for this, but if you are too full, a breastpump will work) and then apply an icepack to reduce inflammation. Don't try to space out feeds. Often mothers are told that they shouldn't feed too much or they will make more milk. This isn't really the case in the early days; milk supply is driven by hormones rather than supply and demand.
Hope that helps. Mums often worry that mastitis will be repetitive, but that is really the case once you are clued in on prevention.

[Mum2SweetCs]

Thank you barb.

Still trying to justify the cost of the breast warmers but if they will never make me have mastitis again I would be more than happy! :-)

[Barb Glare]

The breastwarmers are cheap - but, above and beyond all else it is the management that makes a difference. Applying the breastwarmers and letting your breasts get full and engorged won't prevent mastitis.