The use of human donor milk

### What you need to know A 25 year old woman gave birth to her first child prematurely, at 27 weeks gestation, at Da Nang Hospital for Women and Children, in central Vietnam. The male infant weighed 980 grams and required continuous positive airway pressure respiratory support in the neonatal intensive care unit. Neonatal care nurses provided breastfeeding counselling and support to the mother, and the infant received mother’s own milk as well as pasteurised donor milk in the first four days of life. From the fifth day of life, the mother was able to produce enough breast milk to meet her son’s nutritional needs. During the hospital stay, the neonatal nurses encouraged the mother to breastfeed, store breast milk for her son, and donate her surplus breast milk to the human milk bank. She became a breast milk donor when her son was 45 days old and still hospitalised. The mother continued donating breast milk once she returned home, ultimately donating 62 L of breast milk over five months. The mother was proud to be a breast milk donor to newborns in need. In line with global recommendations from the World Health Organization (WHO), the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) and …