Bundle of interventions to promote breast milk donation among eligible mothers and to optimize its utilization in a tertiary care extra mural new-born unit - A Quasi EXperimental study

Breast feeding is the best  method of infant feeding. According to WHO, if mothers Own  milk is unavailable or insufficient , the next best option is to use pasteurized donor human milk . In India, where the incidence of preterm and low birth weight is high, there is a need for donor human milk for babies whose mothers don’t produce enough milk. In extra mural unit like Institute of child health, Egmore, where sick babies get admitted there is lot of stress among mothers , so there is a need for increasing the milk output and motivating the concept of donation. From the review of literature it is  evident that recruitement  of donors to the milk bank should be continuous process and various strategies have to be undertaken to recruit new donors. It is also evident that the main motivating factor for breast milk donation is excess milk, altruistic feelings and motivation by health professional . Some simple individual measures like frequent expression of milk from the breast, breast massage prior to expression and relaxation music have been found to Increase breast milk volume .Breast  feeding support and motivation by health professional  has been associated with human milk donation.But studies have not been done implementing all these measures as a bundle to increase breast milk donation.

So, this study is being undertaken to increase breast milk donation among eligible mothers by implementing the bundle of interventions and to optimize utilization of collected donor milk by implementing prescription based distribution of donor milk.