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Rush Mothers’ Milk Club
Helping Premature Babies Get a Better Start
One of the greatest challenges that premature infants face is the lack of adequate nutrition in the first months of their lives. While mother’s milk provides the ideal sustenance, there are often challenges associated with delivering this milk to babies, especially those in incubators and/or dependent upon life-support systems.
At Rush University Medical Center in Chicago, cutting-edge work is being done to support nursing mothers and infants in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Headed by Dr. Paula Meier, the Rush Mothers’ Milk Club provides support to mothers, especially in low-income and minority communities. This support includes peer-counseling, guidance on nutrition, expert consultation, and low-cost pump and scale rentals. The Kenneth and Anne Griffin Foundation has supported Dr. Meier’s efforts since 2008.
Learn more about the Rush Mothers’ Milk Club.
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Leader Spotlight:
Dr. Paula Meier
 Dr. Paula Meier is a Professor of Pediatrics and of Women, Children, and Family Nursing at the Rush University Medical Center in Chicago and Director for Clinical Research and Lactation in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Thanks to her work, thousands of Chicago’s babies have benefited from improved nutrition in their earliest days. An expert in breastfeeding and lactation for high-needs infants, she created the innovative Rush Mothers’ Milk Club in 1996 because “mothers of premature or high-risk infants have physiologic and emotional barriers to the initiation and maintenance of lactation.”
She serves on the Health Advisory Board for La Leche League International and is president-elect for the International Society for Research in Human Milk and Lactation. She was an expert panelist at the Centers for Disease Control and Office of Women’s Health, Call to Action on Breastfeeding, in 2009.
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