#294 – Dynamics of human milk expression after very preterm birth in the NICU: Dr Ilana Levene

In this episode, I had the pleasure of speaking with Dr Ilana Levene, who is now a Neonatology subspeciality trainee at Oxford, England. Ilana has done some fantastic work on exploring the important topic of human milk expression. She described her randomized control trial in using relaxing techniques to facilitate human milk expression in the NICU. She shared the challenges that she had in conducting her RCT. We also talked about RCTs with negative results and how negative results are also important in conducting research. Ilana has now created a website with printables for parents and staff in the NICU on human milk expression. This can be assessed for free here : http://www.hifn.org/printable . Ilana also shared her interest in perinatal equity and shared details on her project Spectrum which involves gathering photos of the lactating breast conditions/chest from people with a wide spectrum of skin
colours. These will be provided as a free educational image library. Currently she is chairing a priority setting partnership for LGBTQIA+ perinatal care.

As always, feel free to send us questions, comments, or suggestions to our email: nicupodcast@gmail.com. You can also contact the show through Instagram or Twitter, @nicupodcast. Or contact Ben and Daphna directly via their Twitter profiles: @drnicu and @doctordaphnamd. The papers discussed in today's episode are listed and timestamped on the webpage linked below.

Enjoy!