Core Curriculum For Interdisciplinary Lactation Care Pdf Access

Leo’s weight has dropped 9%. The pediatrician, also curriculum-trained, doesn’t panic or immediately order formula. Instead, she asks the IBCLC to do a pre- and post-feed weight check. The IBCLC finds poor milk transfer. The speech therapist, called for a feeding assessment, spots a subtle lip tie and restricted lingual frenulum.

Maria, a new mother recovering from an unplanned C-section, struggles to feed her son, Leo. The postpartum nurse, trained using the curriculum, notices not just latch difficulty but Maria’s flinching with movement—a sign of surgical pain affecting positioning. She pages the physical therapist, who arrives with a wedge pillow and shows Maria a side-lying position that protects her incision. core curriculum for interdisciplinary lactation care pdf

The group realized: the problem wasn’t a lack of specialists. It was a lack of interdisciplinary fluency. They needed a document that taught, for example, how a posterior tongue-tie might present as reflux (pediatrics), poor weight gain (nutrition), and maternal nipple pain (lactation) simultaneously . Leo’s weight has dropped 9%

That frustration became the seed of an ambitious idea: a core curriculum that would not replace lactation consultants (IBCLCs), but would instead create a baseline of shared knowledge for everyone who touches a lactating parent and baby—doulas, nurses, dietitians, speech-language pathologists, physical therapists, psychologists, and physicians. In 2018, a small working group convened at a university in the Pacific Northwest. It included an IBCLC, a public health researcher, a pediatric dentist, a postpartum mental health counselor, and a family physician. They pooled clinical cases, research papers, and—most importantly—recordings of real parent focus groups. The IBCLC finds poor milk transfer