Is Blood donation Safe in Breastfeeding
Question
I am a breastfeeding mother and i want to know if it is safe to use Blood donation? Is Blood donation safe for nursing mother and child? Does Blood donation extracts into breast milk? Does Blood donation has any long term or short term side effects on infants? Can Blood donation influence milk supply or can Blood donation decrease milk supply in lactating mothers?
Blood donation lactation summary
- DrLact safety Score for Blood donation is 3 out of 8 which is considered Low Risk as per our analyses.
- A safety Score of 3 indicates that usage of Blood donation may cause some minor side effects in breastfed baby.
- Our study of different scientific research indicates that Blood donation may cause moderate to no side effects in lactating mother.
- Most of scientific studies and research papers declaring usage of Blood donation low risk in breastfeeding are based on normal dosage and may not hold true for higher dosage.
- While using Blood donation We suggest monitoring child for possible reactions. It is also important to understand that side effects vary largely based on age of breastfed child and time of medication in addition to dosage.
- Score calculated using the DrLact safety Version 1.2 model, this score ranges from 0 to 8 and measures overall safety of drug in lactation. Scores are primarily calculated using publicly available case studies, research papers, other scientific journals and publically available data.
Answer by Dr. Ru: About Blood donation usage in lactation
Breastfeeding by itself is not a contraindication for blood donation. Restrictions to donate blood by nursing mothers are intended to preserve iron levels and avoid additional nutritional stress. Indeed, it is more related to pregnancy and childbirth than to breastfeeding itself. Various responsible agencies keep a wide range of time-exclusion criteria to become a donor after childbirth, ranging from 6 weeks required by the American Association of Blood Banks and the American Red Cross, to 12 weeks in Paraguay where a previous medical approval is required, 6 months in El Salvador and Hema-Quebec to 9 months by the Australian Red Cross and the United Kingdom Blood Transfusion Services (the latter criterion is to extend exclusion for more than one week the duration of last pregnancy). The Pan American Health Organization and the Spanish Ministry of Health completely exclude nursing mothers of blood donation. Spanish Red Cross excludes those women within 6 months after delivery. Despite this wide variability of criteria, a consensus would be highly desired in order to avoid unnecessary exclusion of donating women mostly because the fact that women are the more frequent blood donors.