Achieving sufficient milk supply supports mothers to cope with premature birth

To explore whether and how expressing breast milk is perceived as helpful in coping with negative emotions due to premature birth by mothers of very low birth weight (VLBW) infants.

Qualitative interviews and a retrospective cross-sectional questionnaire with mothers of VLBW infants were conducted and analysed using an exploratory sequential mixed-method design. Hypotheses were built using qualitative content analysis and quantitatively tested using multivariate regression analysis.

Interviews with 12 mothers and questionnaires of 518 mothers were analysed. Coping with prematurity by expressing milk was seen as a way to maintain the caregiving role for the mothers, where three relevant factors arouse: making up for what happened, providing the best for their infant and fear of low milk supply. Quantitative analysis showed that mothers with a high milk supply (Coef. = 1.1, p < 0.000) and more feelings of guilt due to premature birth (Coef. = -0.1; p = 0.015) perceived expressing breast milk significantly more as a resource for coping.

This study adds knowledge on how expressing breast milk for their VLBW infant may support mothers in coping with premature birth, by revealing the association with milk supply and feelings of guilt due to premature birth.