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FEatured lactation work

“I quickly realized that the resources we take for granted in the United States were nowhere to be found, and often, not available anywhere in Haiti.” 

Explore Dr. Karcher’s work in Haiti to bring lactation training to local Haitian student nurse-midwives and breastfeeding education and care to rural and urban Haitian parents.  

EXCERPTS HAITI

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With a bag full of donated breastfeeding supplies, a mosquito net, and a lactation presentation on a USB stick, I thought I was well-prepared to teach in a setting entirely unlike my own.

As I made my way around two densely packed postpartum rooms, my interpreter translated so I could lactation counsel each parent-baby couplet. Family members flowed in and out through the flapping screen doors. As I cared for one mother, my legs grazed the bed of the mother next to her. No matter how much research I did before the trip, nothing could prepare me for how it would feel to stand at a mother’s bedside with such scarcity of resources to offer her and her newborn.

I learned more than I taught.


-Dr. Lauren Karcher

lactation clinician

One birth parent of twins told me she was brought to the hospital on her head when she had not delivered her second baby over 24 hours after the first. She lost the second baby. I stood in sorrow with her while I weighed the complexities in my head of her surviving baby’s unknown gestation, her likely substantial maternal blood loss, her possible pre-eclampsia, and when her placenta would have separated for the hormonal shift of lactation.

HOME VISITS VIA MOTO

I quickly realized that the resources we take for granted in the United States were nowhere to be found, and often, not available anywhere in Haiti. Without access to therapies such as blood products, phototherapy, and electric breast pumps, the risk factors for lactation failure were increased. Yet, there would be no other sustainable way to feed the baby if these birth parents couldn’t breastfeed. 

IMPROMPTU EDUCATOR

Ten of us - all Creole-speaking - piled into a truck with our pharmacy in a suitcase. Creole music played on the radio as our driver tapped the steering wheel like a drum. An hour or so in, the busy dusty city had turned into boulders, unpaved roads and streams deep into the mountainside. We made our way to an open-air cinder block structure with a wood roof where pregnant and postpartum parents barefoot carrying their babies arrived 1x1 from within the trees. The interpreter translated beautifully as I provided an impromptu group breastfeeding class. 

visiting lecturer

Teaching 35 Creole-speaking student nurse-midwives and preceptors, alongside a translator, is what called me to Haiti. I’m deeply humbled by the privilege of equipping these incredible students with the lactation knowledge they’ll need, knowing they’ll return to their rural communities as the only skilled birth attendants. The impact they’ll make on the health of Haitian families is beyond measure, and I’m honored to have played even a small role in their journey.

what people are saying

"You are my hero."

- Weaned the nipple shield

He latched!  OMG I can't thank you enough.  The time you spent pouring into us will always be remembered.

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what people are saying

“You are so amazing. Thank you for sharing all of your wisdom.”

- Breastfed for 1 year

You are literally the best.

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