Can you get mastitis or other infection by pumping milk?

Question

ive heard you can get it from breast feeding but has anyone got it from pumping the milk instead?

Answer 1

Yes you can get an infection if you dont clean and sterilise the breast pump properly

Answer 2

Yes you can. I have been expressing only, after my newborn damaged a blood capillary in my breast with his extremely toe curling suck!! I got mastitis repeatedly whilst expressing. My doctor suggested using an electric pump instead but I found that this drastically reduced my production.

Answer 3

You are actually more proned to getting Mastitis while pumping because your breast will not completley empty because a pump does not have the same natural reflex as a baby does.  I pumped for 3 months exclusivley because my daughter would not latch and I also produced way too much milk, I got Mastitis twice.  The first time was the worse because I didn't know what to do, so it lasted a week the second time it only lasted a few days.

Just keep in mind that if you do decide to pump exclusivley, ONLY pump what she will eat.  No one told me that, and I would pump the 10 minutes recommended and get 9oz each breast where I only needed 4oz, I ended up going to the ER because of low Magnessium and Calcium, which drew the last straw and I stopped breastfeeding.  Good Luck, and just remember even 1 day of breastmilk is better than none :)

P.S. I was told by the LLC that stress and no sleep will actually bring on Mastitis as well.

Answer 4

You have gotten bad information so far. You can't get mastitis by pumping milk. Mastitis usually occurs when you don't drain your b*****s enough during feeding/pumping. I will recommend you read kellymom.com. It is written by an international board certified lactation consultant - they are the world experts when it comes to breastfeeding. The site has lots of information.

But in a nutshell the answer to your question is no. Please don't believe when people tell you things like this - the majority of the population is incredibly uneducated on breastfeeding matters and there are a lot of myths circulating that need to be debunked. I urge you to refer to kellymom or another IBCLC when you have problems or questions.

Pumping will not cause you infections, really.

Please, read this page, it should help answer your question:

http://www.kellymom.com/bf/concerns/mom/...

Answer 5

I tried breastfeeding for a couple of days then went to manually pumping....I ended up with mastitis not long after....but I would think it was already starting to happen before I started pumping....The problem was I was in denial of not being able to breastfeed & the result was being incredibly sick & sore...no good for bub or mum....I'm now pregnant again & will try breastfeeding again but will have an electric pump close by just in case.....I would think mastitis happens because there is not sufficient milk flow so the ducts get infected....so I wouldn't blame my mastitis on pumping....