WAMC: Baby Café Comes to Albany

WAMC Radio aired a story on the grand opening of the SPHP Baby Café at the Baby Institute in Albany. Erin Sinisgalli, director of SPHP Community Health Programs, and Stephanie Avienu, a lactation specialist with SPHP, were interviewed for the report.

From the story:

“Babies who are breastfed when they’re infants, they actually have a lower rate of obesity all the way until adulthood,” Sinisgalli notes. “And one of the theories behind that is that breastfed babies – they eat until they’re full. And we don’t really know how much they ate, right, because they nurse. But they learn those cues of self-feeding and that, when they’re hungry they eat, when they’re full, they stop.”

Lactation specialists at Albany’s Baby Café are available Tuesdays from 10 to noon. Specialist Stephanie Avienu says a lot of the job is weighing newborns and helping young moms navigate latching – but it’s also about creating a space where mothers can trade advice. Avienu says motherhood can be isolating, and while the internet can provide a sense of community, it also comes with its fair share of myths and misinformation.

“You know, we just kinda joke that it’s a blur of like, boobs and wet diapers, but we say [nursing] about eight to 12 times a day is usually what we’d expect,” she explains. “So approximately every two hours, but not putting the baby on a schedule – watching that baby’s feeding cues. You know, baby will often want to nurse multiple times in the course of an hour, and then might sleep for a little bit.”

Click here to listen to the story and read the full report.