BREASTFEEDING mothers who run into difficulties once home from hospital can now get professional 24 hour help through Baby Matters, a home and clinic based private service recently set up by former hospital midwife and certified lactation consultant, Julie O'Connor.

"Many breastfeeding mothers don't want to have to go back to see a hospital midwife if they have problems breastfeeding. They prefer someone to call to their home and the district nurse usually only calls when the baby is a few weeks old unless you specifically contact her for help when you first arrive home from hospital," says O Connor, who believes that breastfeeding mothers are not adequately supported in the community.

Willing to operate as a one woman breastfeeding advisory flying squad, O'Connor will turn up on the new mother's doorstep day or night to provide moral support or professional advice as it is required.

"There is no point in a new mother waiting for an appointment with her hospital midwife the following morning when she's faced with a crying, screaming baby in the middle of the night," says O'Connor, who will travel within Dublin city and county on receiving a call on her mobile phone from a distraught breastfeeding mother.

"Quite often, just being able to call somebody up in the middle of the night is enough. Mothers of new babies are at their lowest ebb between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. and if you're faced with a baby that won't suck or won't settle, having someone to reassure you is just what you need," she continues.

"I spent two and a half hours with one woman last week who had a simple problem of sore nipples when breastfeeding her third child. If a public health nurse was to spend that much time with a mother, other services would suffer," says O'Connor.

HER combined experience as a hospital midwife and mother of three breastfed children (the youngest of whom, she is still breastfeeding) prompted O Connor to set up Baby Matters. "When I worked as a midwife in a Dublin maternity hospital, I found that women who were returning for their six week check up, had already given up breastfeeding due to problems that could have been solved had they been seen earlier.

"I had my first baby in the UK and I suffered from engorged breasts. I said to my husband `take her away, I've had enough' and had it not been for the community midwife who came to me, I might have given up breastfeeding altogether. I had my second child in Ireland and found that I was very isolated which made me realise there was something missing here", says O'Connor.

Unlike in Britain, where publicly funded community based midwives visit mothers once a day for the first ten days after the baby is born, there is no such back up service here. The Department of Health, in a recent breastfeeding policy document did however, note an aspiration towards setting up breast feeding, clinics in public health centres.

Although she considers voluntary organisations like La Leche League and the Irish Childbirth Trust provide a good mother to mother support network, O'Connor believes some breastfeeding mothers would prefer a professional service.

"Breastfeeding is the natural continuation of pregnancy and labour, however the natural way may not come naturally. Breastfeeding is not always instinctive for the mother or the baby and in many situations, it is a learned skill," says O'Connor.

Approximately 30 per cent of Irish women currently breastfeed their, newborn infants although this figure drops to around 15 per cent when the baby is three months old.

This low percentage of breastfeeding mothers (at least 50 per cent of mothers breastfeed in many other EU countries and in the US) is in spite of both the Department of Health's promotion of breastfeeding and the breastfeeding policies now in place in all Dublin maternity hospitals.

In the aforementioned national breastfeeding policy document, the Department, of Health also noted an aspiration to having 50 per cent of mothers breastfeeding their newborn babies and 30 per cent still breastfeeding four months later by the year 2000.

"Breastfeeding is hard work but if women had more realistic expectations about it, they would cope better. Once you get established in breastfeeding, it is a fantastically therapeutic and relaxing experience," enthuses O'Connor.

Common problems experienced by breastfeeding mothers are sore nipples, engorgement of breasts (i.e. when the breasts fill up with too much milk and the baby won't latch on to the nipple) and mastitis, all of which are treatable and in some cases preventable.

"Sore nipples is the biggest problem breastfeeding mothers face and this is usually due to poor positioning. Quite often, mothers breast feed like they are bottlefeeding whereas they need to turn the baby right over onto their bests," says O'Connor.

Low milk supply is another problem which can put mothers off breastfeeding. "Health workers may advise such mothers to, give up breastfeeding but if they feed more often and take care that the baby has a good latch on position, their milk supply will increase," says O'Connor.

Few women stop breastfeeding because of social pressures as they have already dealt with these when first deciding to breastfeed." However, sometimes, pressure to bottle feed can come from closer to home. "It is always the grandmothers who put mothers off breastfeeding by saying things like `why don't you give that baby, a bottle' or `isn't it hard not knowing how much the baby is getting'," says O'Connor.

SHE believes that if grandmothers were encouraged to come to a breastfeeding ante natal class (which she also runs in Baby Matters), the mothers would in turn have more, confidence to breastfeed exclusively. "Most husbands nowadays are supportive of their wives decision to breastfeed but breastfeeding has skipped a generation in Ireland. If the grandmothers were educated about breastfeeding, they could help their daughters a lot."

The service offered by Baby Matters costs £24 for the first visit (plus petrol expenses for home visits) and a negotiated fee for later visits. "If a woman simply needs a mothers' support group and she can't afford to pay for the service offered by Baby Matters, I will refer her to La Leche League or the Irish Childbirth Trust," adds O'Connor.