story and photo by
Van Mitchell, Staff Writer
The Milk Bar Lactation Support Group at INTEGRIS Health Edmond Hospital is a breastfeeding support group open to all mothers regardless of the facility in which they delivered.
It’s designed to be a safe place for moms to come together and share their breastfeeding experiences and knowledge or seek advice.
They meet every Wednesday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. at INTEGRIS Health Edmond Hospital on the 4th floor in the Women’s Center. This is a come and go event, free of charge with no registration required.
They also have a weekend Milk Bar that meets the third Sunday each month from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m.
“We serve 20 to 25 momma/babies every Wednesday in our free community lactation support group called the Milk Bar,” said Angela Kersh, RN, CBC, CLC (Certified Lactation Counselor). “We have patients that deliver all over the state come see us every Wednesday and the third Sunday of the month. It’s my favorite day of the week! We also have a Facebook page where moms can ask questions and the three of us (RN’s) answer.”
Connie Barta, RN, IBCLC, and Milk Bar facilitator, said they have mom’s from across the state come to the Milk Bar.
“Some of our babies were delivered at Mercy, or OU, Lakeside, Baptist, Stillwater Medical Center,” Barta said. “We’ll have patients that drive in from Shawnee, Mustang, Yukon, Guthrie, Cushing, Perkins, Stillwater, Enid, and even Alene in northwestern Oklahoma.”
Barta said the Milk Bar is a community outreach program that INTEGRIS Health offers.
“We’ve had 900-1000 women in attendance (total) over the last 12 months (at INTEGRIS Health Edmond Hospital),” she said. “Many come weekly and sign in each week, so it’s not necessarily 900 newcomers, but still impactful.”
The Milk Bar at INTEGRIS Health Edmond Hospital is led by Barta, Kersh, and Tera Oss RNC-OB, CBS.
Kersh teaches breastfeeding classes, labor and delivery, childbirth classes, comfort measures, CPR, newborn classes at INTEGRIS Health Edmond Hospital.
She said they work hard to welcome and make mothers/babies comfortable at the Milk Bar.
“We’ll come sit down and talk to them, kind of go over what’s going on with them and their baby, offer any suggestions, help and support that they need,” she said.
Kersh said before and after breastfeeding, each baby is weighed, and they inform the mothers of the weight, and how much they need to transfer (breastmilk).
“After they feed the baby, they go back to the scale. And when they’re back at the scale, we do the math and tell them what they’re able to transfer,” she said. “A lot of times when breastfeeding, they don’t really know how much the baby’s eating. So here, we can tell them exactly what their baby’s able to transfer, and we track week by week their progress. We can tell if a baby has adequate weight gain or not, and we help make plans accordingly, and make outpatient appointments if we need to see them more one-on-one.”
Oss is a certified breastfeeding specialist.
“Our goal is to help troubleshoot any concerns,” Oss said. “I would say my role, I usually weigh the babies, and I help feed whenever there’s concerns, and then flag one of them to say, “Okay, Angela or Connie, come help troubleshoot.” And they help with latch, or repositioning, figuring out why we’re not gaining appropriately. So yeah, I would say they’re worthy experts.”
Oss said she enjoys working with her Milk Bar team and helping educate mothers.
“I’m a labor and delivery nurse and I started doing this,” she said. “I enjoy this so much that I wanted to become certified in lactation because I feel like it would make me a better nurse on the floor for my labor and delivery patients. I just love it, and I feel like it’s helpful for the patients to have somebody that’s supporting them on the labor and delivery side, too. We love each other. I feel like we’ve got a sisterhood bond.”
Oss said she was fortunate to have a support system after giving birth.
“It was not easy,” she said. “I didn’t have a group like this, but I had somebody there every day, check in, walk with me because it was really challenging. And that is kind of the goal of this group, to let people know they are not alone, it’s not always easy, but you can do it, and you can do hard things.”
Barta said there are benefits to mothers who breastfeed.
“It helps decrease the woman’s risk of breast cancer, ovarian cancer, osteoporosis, helps her get back to pre-pregnancy weight quicker because they’re burning calories as they breastfeed. It’s convenient. You don’t have to wash any bottles,” she said.
Barta said the benefits to babies who are breastfed are decreased risk of diabetes, obesity, asthma, chronic ear infections, pneumonia, diarrhea, lymphoma, sicknesses like RSV because they’re getting those antibodies from the milk.
Oss said there are emotional impacts to women after giving birth and breastfeed.
“People don’t understand the things that happen the first several months (after birth) for women,” she said. “It impacts how they think about themselves forever. “If we can help them have a positive experience breastfeeding and giving the encouragement that they need to meet their own goals, then we’ve helped the family unit, we’ve helped our society, we’ve helped our country, and the health of our country as well.”
For more information about the Milk Bar contact the INTEGRIS Health Edmond Hospital Women’s Center at 405-657-3250.
