Breast care

Daily hygiene

During breastfeeding, the nipple and the area surrounding it must be thoroughly cleaned both before and after breastfeeding. As a detergent, boiled or distilled water can be used, but generally it is convenient to use cotton wool pads already soaked in detergents: it is better to avoid soap (especially if it is not neutral), because using it in this way is often "violent" for the skin .

After cleaning at the end of the feed, apply a greasy ointment and then some gauze or breast pads (special pads to protect the nipple) until the next feed. If the milk flows spontaneously and dirties the linen, just insert special milk-absorbing cups between the breast and the bra, which are thrown away after use.

Abrasions and fissures

Simple peeling of the nipple skin is annoying, but heals easily.

The case of fissures is quite different: they are cracks that can have a circular pattern all around the nipple or arranged in a radial pattern with the center on the tip of the nipple itself. In any case, the fissures make breastfeeding extremely painful and moreover they represent an open passage for microbes that can make inflammation of the breast possible (mastitis).

To prevent them, you need to strengthen your nipples already during pregnancy with adequate preparation.

The other precaution is not to keep the baby attached to the same breast for too long. At the beginning, it must be started by keeping it for a maximum of 5 minutes per breast and then alternating the two breasts; then the feeding time for each breast will gradually increase up to about 10 minutes.

To cure them you need a special silver nipple cover or suspend breastfeeding for at least 24-48 hours and treat the part with a special healing ointment. In order not to leave the baby without milk and to prevent milk secretion from decreasing, a special nipple can be applied to the breast that allows the baby to suck without touching the breast or a breast pump equipped with a teat.