Hospital report card

The Illinois Department of Public Health has added the rates of breastfeeding of newborns for each hospital. The Hospital Report Card can be found at http://www.healthcarereportcard.illinois.gov.

Presumably, hospitals that have a high percentage of babies going home breastfeeding, have a staff that are very supportive of helping a new mother and baby establish a good start on breastfeeding.

Along with checking a hospital’s report card, you could also call the hospital and ask what will be offered in support of lactation.

Revolutionize the practice of pediatrics

There was a very interesting article in the March 28 2011 issue of The New Yorker. A pediatrician in San Francisco is making the link between childhood trauma and adult diseases. Traumas that children endure, including neglect and abuse,  have been associated with adult diseases such as cancer and heart disease even when the intermediary factors such as poor lifestyle (diet and exercise) have been eliminated. If this can be replicated in a larger study, it has the potential for revolutionizing the practice of pediatrics. One challenge in implementing this approach is recognizing an individual child’s neglect and abuse, especially in a very young child because the child herself is not the reporter. It may be that the person(s) responsible for the trauma are also the ones providing the health care professionals with  information about the child and the child’s experiences.