Patient's question:
I am a cesarean mother and the second daughter. Due to pre-surgery diarrhea, I haven't eaten for three or four days. Now, a week after the surgery, I have milk, but it hasn't fully come in yet. So, I can only use a breast pump to extract some milk for my baby. I put the extracted milk in a bottle and feed her when she's hungry. But I don't know how long this milk should be kept for it to be safe.What kind of help I need: How long should the milk extracted by the breast pump be stored?
Doctor's answer:
According to what you mentioned, milk expressed with a breast pump can be stored at room temperature for about 6 hours, and it can be stored for longer, around 3 days, in the refrigerator's. The breast pump should be cleaned and disinfected daily, and the containers used to store breast milk must be clean and sterilized. Do not fill the container too full or tightly close the lid; leave some space in the container.When heating breast milk, it is recommended to rinse it with flowing warm water for a few minutes to reach the appropriate milk temperature. Never heat breast milk directly over a flame or in a microwave, as this may destroy the nutritional components of the milk.
Heated milk should not be placed back in the refrigerator. If there is a power outage, drink the milk promptly or discard it.