Though a growing percentage of American moms start their infants on human milk, relatively few continue breast-feeding for the baby's first six months of life, let alone an entire year.
Why not stick it out longer? Numerous obstacles can prove difficult for new moms, but California researchers say they found that returning to work soon after giving birth presents a major barrier to successful breast-feeding.
"What we saw is if women take very short maternity leaves, of six weeks or less, they run more than a three times higher risk of quitting breast-feeding compared to those still at home who haven't returned to work," said Sylvia Guendelman, a professor who chairs the maternal and child health program at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Public Health.
Their study, published earlier this year in Pediatrics, was part of a larger analysis called "Juggling Work and Life During Pregnancy," funded by the U.S. government's Maternal and Child Health Bureau.
By Karen Pallarito © 2009 Microsoft
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