What Every Nursing Mother Can Learn From Dr Olaitan About Breasts Sagging

Breast sagging is a natural process that happens to women,it can be as a result of age or breastfeeding where the breasts lose their suppleness and elasticity.

Dr (Mrs) Onayiga Olaitan, Medical Director, Lagos-based Queen of Mercy Medical Centre, talks about this and a lot more with Josephine Agbonkhese of the Vanguard.

On how breastfeeding make the breasts sag

There is a way a woman should breastfeed her baby. If you go through the normal position for breastfeeding, there is the likelihood that the breasts might not sag. However, in majority of women, breastfeeding makes the breast sag. This is because during the process of lactation, the breasts would have enlarged with a lot of milk collection in it. Eventually, after about a year when you have weaned your baby and the breast has to go back to its original size, there is the tendency that it is going to sag because of the space the milk had occupied before. But for some women, the sagging is more likely to happen if they don’t sit properly during breastfeeding; in a way that the child does not have to stretch the breast to feed.

On if bras can help breasts go back to shape after breastfeeding

There is a possibility but it is not to the normal size. What happens in a sagged breast is that the tissues are already loose, so, wearing some bras like the ‘packing’ bras, could actually help to reduce the looseness. As such, we can also reduce the sagging but not bring the breast back to normal totally.

It is advised that while a woman is breastfeeding, she should not leave her breast without bras because during these period, the breast is loose. So, it is better you wear bras so that they help to keep the tissues in the breasts firm. But most women believe wearing a bra while still breastfeeding would weaken milk flow… That is not true.

The mechanism of breastfeeding and breast milk production has nothing to do with bras. When the child puts the mouth to suckle, there are some messages that are sent to some parts of the brain and automatically, you have the release of hormones and the milk automatically comes out. So, the only thing that can impede breast milk’s flow is if the child is not sucking properly. But once the child is sucking properly, whether you wear tight bras or not does not matter; that will even help prevent the breast from getting unnecessarily engorged.

SOURCE: Vanguard

Ogadinma Mgbajah Is The First Female Cardiothoracic Surgeon In West Africa

Dr Ogadinma Mgbajah is the first woman to become a Cardiothoracic Surgeon In West Africa

With no clue that that there had not been a female in the field before her in West Africa, Ogadinma only wanted a platform to help people who have heart problems, however, she has emerged West Africa’s first female open-heart surgeon .

Practicing at the Lagos State University Teaching Hospital, Ogadinma Mgbajah said lecturers and examiners during the course of her training pointed it out to her that she was the first female in that field and that had encouraged her to continue.

In an interview with Punch in May, Ogadinma asserted there were competitions although very subtle from her male colleagues.

“I think the society has a way of conditioning women to think that there are some areas that do not belong to them. You cannot take away culture from us as Nigerians. We think that there is a limit to what a woman is supposed to do.  When you speak to medical students about what they want to do, they start by saying, “well, I’m a woman…” The fact that she is a woman clouds her judgement. She is her own biggest challenge. A woman needs to know that all you need to do is identify a problem and ask yourself if you have the capacity to solve this problem. If you don’t, can you build the capacity? If yes, then you go for it.” she said

Ogadinma also explained that her training took seven years and she had all her children within that period.

Speaking about the challenges of open-heart surgery in Nigeria, Ogadinma explained that providing for the care is expensive.

“Basically, the challenge with this specialty is because it is very precise. To provide cardiothoracic care is very costly. I am hoping we will get a lot of government support and health insurance to be able to help people who have this problem.”

“Nigeria has very few cardiothoracic surgeons because after the training, people ask themselves if they would actually be able to practise because most of the patients you see don’t have the finance to support themselves. A lot of patients are not even aware because a lot of cardiac problems are seen as spiritual attack. A lot of people have taken it as a death sentence when they walk into a hospital and they are told their hearts have failed. But there are so much that can be done to give such people a good quality of life.”

SOURCE: Womanng