Sushma Nangia1, Viraraghavan Vadakkencherry Ramaswamy2, Maheshwar Bhasin3. 1. Department of Neonatology, Lady Hardinge Medical College and Kalawati Saran Children's Hospital, New Delhi, India. 2. Department of Neonatology, Nori Multi Speciality Hospital, Vijayawada, India. 3. Vatsalya Maatri Amrit Kosh, Comprehensive Lactation Management Centre, Lady Hardinge Medical College, New Delhi, India.
Abstract
Background: Donor human milk plays a vital part in the care of sick neonates. There is paucity of literature on the profile of human milk donors of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Materials and Methods: This retrospective observational study evaluated the demographic profile of 1,553 donors of a human milk bank of a tertiary care center from a LMIC over a period of 21 months. Results: The mean age of the donors was 21.6 ± 2.7 years. Around 63% of the donors were from the postnatal care wards and 53.3% had given birth to a premature infant. The total volume of human milk donated was 413 L and the mean volume of milk per donor was 268 ± 386 mL. The mean amount of milk donated by the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) mothers was significantly higher when compared to that donated by the postnatal care ward mothers (p = 0.0001). Two-thirds (65.5%) of the donated milk was from mothers who gave birth to a preterm infant and 20.8% was from mothers of preterm neonates of <32 weeks of gestation. There was no statistical difference between the mean amount of milk donated by a mother who had delivered extremely preterm neonates when compared to those who had delivered very preterm neonates (p = 0.18). Conclusions: The predominant donors of a human milk bank from a LMIC are of a younger age group, are more likely to have delivered a premature or a low birth weight baby, and are mostly the ones whose neonates require NICU admission or from postnatal care wards.
Background: Donorhuman milk plays a vital part in the care of sick neonates. There is paucity of literature on the profile of human milk donors of low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Materials and Methods: This retrospective observational study evaluated the demographic profile of 1,553 donors of a human milk bank of a tertiary care center from a LMIC over a period of 21 months. Results: The mean age of the donors was 21.6 ± 2.7 years. Around 63% of the donors were from the postnatal care wards and 53.3% had given birth to a premature infant. The total volume of human milk donated was 413 L and the mean volume of milk per donor was 268 ± 386 mL. The mean amount of milk donated by the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) mothers was significantly higher when compared to that donated by the postnatal care ward mothers (p = 0.0001). Two-thirds (65.5%) of the donated milk was from mothers who gave birth to a preterm infant and 20.8% was from mothers of preterm neonates of <32 weeks of gestation. There was no statistical difference between the mean amount of milk donated by a mother who had delivered extremely preterm neonates when compared to those who had delivered very preterm neonates (p = 0.18). Conclusions: The predominant donors of a human milk bank from a LMIC are of a younger age group, are more likely to have delivered a premature or a low birth weight baby, and are mostly the ones whose neonates require NICU admission or from postnatal care wards.
Entities:
Keywords:
donor milk; human milk bank; human milk donor