Expressions of love: Donated breast milk can help with baby formula shortage

Maddie Sponsler is breastfeeding her 1½ year old, so up until recently she didn’t know about the nationwide shortage of baby formula. 

But Sponsler, a mother of three, had some complications that prevented her from breastfeeding her oldest son, now 15. She breastfed and supplemented with formula for the first few months for her middle daughter, now 4, and has exclusively breastfed her youngest.

The Wadsworth mom, 35, recently signed up to provide her excess breast milk to the OhioHealth Mothers’ Breast Milk Bank, which provides milk to neonatal intensive care units throughout the country and to some to community members, with a prescription.

“It just seems like what I need to do since we have [excess],” said Sponsler, who estimates she has grocery bags full of frozen milk in her freezer. Her 1½-year-old daughter, Katelynn, is still breastfeeding, but not drinking Sponsler’s milk from a cup, so Sponsler pumps at work to maintain her supply.

“Since we have it, I want to be able to help other babies. I cannot imagine what some parents are going through,” said Sponsler, who works for an e-commerce company in downtown Akron. “We have been very blessed by God that we have three healthy children, but I know that's not always the case."

She said if she could help ease the challenges of feeding for another mother, "then I want to do it."

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OhioHealth Mothers' Milk Bank provides donated milk

The Milk Bank, which is headquartered in Columbus, has seen an increase in women who want to donate their excess breast milk during the baby formula shortage, said Chris Smith, operations and outreach coordinator. The milk bank is also getting some calls from moms looking to feed their babies, she said.

“We're getting many calls every day of moms wanting to help other moms and feeling bad for those moms who are struggling to find formula,” Smith said. “We're putting them through the screening process as quickly as we can to get them approved. We have a good supply of milk on hand."

The Milk Bank accepts frozen breast milk that has been pumped within eight months and has the donors screened for health and lifestyle history and medications taken. A blood screening is also performed. A mother’s doctor also needs to approve she can donate. Frozen milk can be used within one year, but the bank needs time to process and distribute, Smith said.

Once accepted, donors from across the state can either take donations to one of 16 drop-off locations or all the materials needed to ship the supply can be mailed to the donor.  There is not a drop-off in the Akron region — the closest is in Beachwood, though Smith is trying to get one in Canton.

The milk is gathered and pasteurized with other donations before being distributed.

To contact the OhioHealth Mothers' Milk Bank, call 614-566-0630 or email MilkBank@OhioHealth.com

Last year, the Milk Bank dispensed 400,000 ounces of milk across multiple states.

Exclusive breastfeeding for 6 months recommended

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends exclusively breastfeeding for the first six months, but any breast milk is helpful for infants, said Smith.

Sometimes, the donated milk is also to supplement a mom’s milk — or a mom may not be able to breastfeed due to medications or a medical condition, Smith said.

Mothers who have donated milk include mothers who are actively breastfeeding and produce more than their child needs and mothers who are ending their breastfeeding and want to donate excess while they wean their child. There are also legacy mothers who are donors whose babies or children have died and they wish to continue to pump and donate their milk supply in honor or memory of their child.

The Milk Bank is primarily funded by hospitals that receive the donated milk, but some private or Medicaid insurances will cover the cost of donor milk with prior authorization, said Smith. That is usually for a baby who is not tolerating formula and for whom breast milk is medically necessary, she said.

“It's the moms with the private insurance or the moms that have got the ‘healthy’ babies that can't get the formula that are going to be struggling,” said Smith.

Smith said there is a priority, according to the Human Milk Banking Association of North America to send supply to hospitals first and then medically fragile babies and healthy babies last. But Smith said right now there is an abundant supply of donated breast milk, so the organization is working on figuring out how to offer milk to healthy babies with moms, perhaps, paying for the shipping.

If a doctor approves it, a baby who was exclusively on formula could be switched to breast milk or a combination of feeding formula and breast milk in separate bottles, Smith said. A prescription from a doctor is needed for any community donation requests for breast milk, she said.

“The hope is to get these people through maybe one or two weeks' worth of donor milk until they can get back in to the get the formula,” she said, adding that it wouldn’t be sustainable to switch a healthy baby completely to donated breast milk.

Donor milk for preemies

Donated milk is a lifeline for babies, especially premature infants, said Liz Maseth, a board certified lactation consultant and nurse program coordinator of lactation consultants for Akron Children’s Hospital. Some moms may not produce as much milk or enough for their babies due to a variety of reasons that could include medical conditions or even stress and anxiety, she said.

There’s also a lot of pressure on moms to produce a certain amount of milk — and every body is different, said Maseth, who works with moms in the hospital and outpatient.

“Some are moms that are in overproduction. Not all moms are able to be there. I consider myself what we call the ‘just enough.’ I was just able to make just what my baby needed,” she said.

Maseth works with moms locally who are interested in donating to the Milk Bank, either because they have excess supply and moms who have experienced a loss and want to pump and donate their supply.

Maseth has also worked with adoptive moms and lesbian moms to stimulate milk production in cases where one mom may have given birth to the child and another wants to breastfeed. That approach includes birth-control pills, which gives women both estrogen and progesterone as well as domperidone, which increases the prolactin levels and stimulation of the breast.

Experts caution about informal sharing

Informal sharing of breast milk among mothers in the community is increasing, especially during the baby-formula shortage. Smith and Maseth said mothers need to screen others carefully.

The Academy of Breastfeeding in 2017 issued a policy statement, warnings and suggestions if mothers do participate in informal sharing. The Academy said there are potential risks and dangers if there is not proper screening of the milk.

“I had somebody describe it as, 'would you be willing to have that person give your baby blood?'" Smith said. "If it's a family member, if it's a close friend, if it's somebody in your community, that's one thing. If it's somebody that you're meeting on the Internet that you don't know, that's a whole different story.”

Freezers full of breast milk

The Sponslers' freezer started filling up last fall with frozen breast milk, and her husband even had trouble finding space for butchered meat he had bought.

“As our freezer filled up, I was like, I just can't throw this away like it doesn't matter. And then I remembered many years ago, I saw somebody on social media talk about, like, donating it,” said Maddie Sponsler.

She began her research in October and reached out to the OhioHealth Mothers’ Milk Bank. Several months passed as Sponsler researched answers to her questions.

Sponsler knew her milk was good for her daughter, but said she knew her donated would was going to tiny babies, "and I wanted to make sure that what I was giving them was the best.”

Recently, Sponsler started the process up again and went in to see Maseth for her testing. She only recently got approved and was preparing to send her first shipment to the Milk Bank earlier this week.

Sponsler said she feels like it was “God’s timing” that she for some reason had dragged her feet and now was ready to donate during a baby-formula shortage.

“My oldest was formula-fed, and if I didn't have formula, I don't know what I would have done. And he had some dietary issues when he was younger and he had to be on special formula, so breast milk probably would have been the best option for him,” she said.

“My heart just goes out to those parents that are facing this,” she said. “I just really encourage other moms out there, if they have the ability to donate just to look into doing it... to help love on those babies a little bit more.”

Smith said the need for donated milk is constant.

“We have an ongoing need even without the formula shortage to provide milk to these NICUs and these premature babies because it really is life saving for them,” she said. “Donor milk to a premature infant is like blood to a trauma patient. It's lifesaving.”

Beacon Journal staff reporter Betty Lin-Fisher can be reached at 330-996-3724 or blinfisher@thebeaconjournal.com. Follow her @blinfisherABJ on Twitter or www.facebook.com/BettyLinFisherABJ To see her most recent stories and columns, go to www.tinyurl.com/bettylinfisher

This article originally appeared on Akron Beacon Journal: Wadsworth mom donates breast milk during baby formula shortage