Donor Human Milk

Donor Milk and Milk Banks

Donor Human Milk is milk from a healthy, screened donor, which is then pasteurized and distributed to another family in need. The Human Milk Banking Association of North America (HMBANA) is the only professional membership association for milk banks in North America and sets the standards and guidelines for donor milk banking.  The 11-member milk banks collect milk from carefully screened donors, gently pasteurize the milk, then distribute it to requesting hospitals and individual recipients for medically fragile babies and others whose mothers are not able to provide breast milk for their own babies.

Statements & Policy Papers on Donor Human Milk and Milk Banking

Northwest Mothers Milk Bank (NWMMB)

The Northwest Mothers Milk Bank (NWMMB) is a non-profit HMBANA milk bank with 10 donor drop off sites.  They have been granted space from Providence Health & Services, at their Sunset Medical Center building on SW Barnes Road, and recently received $125,000 from the OHIPP collective -- Oregon Health Insurers Partnering for Prevention towards their equipment capital campaign.

Once they purchase the necessary processing equipment to locally pasteurize and distribute donor human milk, they will join the community of milk banks across the continent, who are protecting medically fragile infants from the complications that arise from formula use.

Resources for Clinicians Regarding Use of Donor Milk

The 2010 BCO Annual Conference featured Dr. Jae Kim and Dr. Lisa Stellwagen from the University of California San Diego, to discuss their innovative Supporting Premature Infant Nutrition program (SPIN).  They generously agreed to allow us to post all of their power point presentations.  They are available for download by selecting the title, but be aware that many of these are very large files.