IBCLC Detailed Content Outline: Clinical Skills / Education and Communication Focused CERPs - Section VII B

Brandi Gates-Burgess is a Lactation Consultant at Highland Hospital, Community Engagement specialist for the MILK Research Lab, serves on the Community Advisory Board of the UCSF Preterm Birth Initiative, and Co-chairs The Breastfeeding Cultural Outreach Taskforce (BCOT). Recently, Brandi transitioned from her 16-year career providing lactation support to families of the California WIC Program and decided to live her dream. She started her non-profit organization Breast Friends Lactation Support Services where she provides group lactation education and support to Black Families in the Bay Area. She is a mother to 4 breastfed children, wife and world traveler.

Jodi is registered nurse with a strong passion for preemies, developmental care in the NICU, parent teaching, and education. When not at the bedside, Jodi is hard at work offering support and lending a virtual hand to parents of NICU babies through her organization Peekaboo ICU. Jodi is the president/CEO as well as a Family Support Specialist that heads up the organization’s Journey Bead Program- offering a tangible way to track, document, and celebrate milestones in the NICU. Jodi attended college in Ontario Canada where she completed her nursing degree. After college, Jodi earned a number of certification in neonatal nursing including her RNC-NIC, Developmental Care Specialist certification, and an Advanced Certification in Neonatal nursing while attending BCIT’s Bachelor of Science in Neonatal Nursing degree program. Jodi is currently working towards her Masters of Science in Nursing-Care Coordination degree through Capella University.

Alyssa has been helping parents and babies with breastfeeding since 2002, first as a La Leche League Leader and since 2009 as an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant.

Alyssa works in private practice serving clients worldwide, primarily through telehealth. She is the author of Breastfeeding Without Birthing: A Breastfeeding Guide for Mothers Through Adoption, Surrogacy, and Other Special Circumstances and a professional supplement to the book, The Breastfeeding Without Birthing Professional Pack online training.

Alyssa has authored articles for The Journal of Human Lactation: The Three Step Framework for Inducing Lactation and Successful Co-Lactation by a Queer Couple: A Case Study. She has also authored articles for La Leche League’s Leader Today and Breastfeeding Today magazines, and Adoptive Families magazine. She is an international speaker on the topics of inducing lactation, relactation, and other related topics. Alyssa is the proud mother of three breastfed children, two by birth and one by adoption. She lives in St. Louis, Missouri, USA.

Paulina Erices is the mother of three multicultural Latino children and Project Director for Lifespan Local. Paulina earned her BS in Psychology from the Pennsylvania State University, a MS in Organizational leadership from the University of Denver and is completing her PhD in Health and Behavioral Sciences at the University of Colorado - Denver. Paulina has over 18 years of experience working with families with young children. As a Maternal Child Health specialist for Jefferson County Public Health, she developed a NICU follow-up home visitation program and the pediatric emergency preparedness plan, co-founded and coordinated the Conectando Network (former Adelante Jeffco), established community navigation and lactation support groups focused on the Latino Spanish speaking community, and lead other initiatives to support leadership and partnerships among communities and organizations. During the COVID-19 pandemic, she managed the new program Whole Community Inclusion to ensure the pandemic response and recovery implementation included health equity practices that recognize the needs and the strengths of priority populations in the county. Her areas of current work include promoting perinatal and infant mental health along the continuum of care; building community capacity to navigate health and education systems; facilitating organizational change to embrace linguistic and culturally responsive practices; and establishing community-placed participatory programs to strengthen communities. She likes to be with people, learn from and with others, and connect passions for meaningful work.

In 2014, Ghanaian-American mother and photographer, Vanessa Simmons authored the Normalize Breastfeeding™ movement to address the taboo of public breastfeeding in modern society. Her mission was to document diverse variations of normal infant feeding, across cultures and delivery methods of human milk. Through Simmons' viral blog, her photographic speaking tour, philanthropy, and artistic inspiration; she mobilized and motivated thousands of women to share their breastfeeding photos on social media. After a very successful first year, she reached out to the Mayor of San Diego to proclaim June 27th the International Day to Normalize Breastfeeding, in support of the worldwide anniversary event! Lactation educator and activist, Vanessa Simmons, is now speaking out at conferences and events across the country to eliminate general miseducation around the topic. On the Normalize Breastfeeding podcast, she interviews guests about experiences, advocacy, and activism within the infant feeding community worldwide. As a public speaker, Simmons is focused on transforming the modern mindset around the natural, yet difficult task of breastfeeding. Vanessa trains lactation professionals to better understand and connect with millennial families online. She creatively motivates and inspires families to be mindful that this is a time to be cherished, and although fleeting, it is also a time to reinvent what will be acceptable for feeding generations of the future. Simmons is an aspiring author and resides with her supportive husband and three children in San Diego, CA.

Lucy Ruddle is an IBCLC in the UK. She has a thriving private Practice on the South Coast and a busy Facebook page known for it's funny, relevant, and informative memes about breastfeeding and parenting. Lucy qualified in 2018 after 5 years of volunteering as a peer supporter and later as a breastfeeding counselor for a national breastfeeding helpline. She has written a book on relactation, called "Relactation - A guide to rebuilding your milk supply." which was published by Praeclarus Press in January 2020. Lucy's interest in relactation started after she went through the process herself for her eldest baby, and her drive to qualify as an IBCLC came from a second challenging breastfeeding journey with her younger son who was unable to latch for several months. Aside from lactation, Lucy holds a diploma in Child Psychology and worked for 15 years in early years settings, both with the children and in roles supporting parents. She prides herself on her listening focused approach to lactation support, and sees it as the key to good practice in her own work.

Naida Hawkins is a Registered Nurse and Lactation consultant in North Battleford, Saskatchewan. She is a passionate registered nurse who has cared for breastfeeding families for 14 years.

Almereau Prollius is an Obstetrician and Gynecologist in Saskatoon, SK. Together with Naida they have a special interest in strategies to promote successful breast feeding and are advocates of prenatal hand expression. They work as part of an interdisciplinary team supporting families to have an easier time starting and continuing breastfeeding.

More Milk Sooner is their program which supports and promotes hand expression in the antenatal and early postpartum period. Based out of Saskatoon and North Battleford in Saskatchewan, they hope to empower patients and care providers to increase successful breastfeeding. They are delighted to be sharing their journey with you. They are actively involved in research reviewing the outcomes of the implementation of the prenatal hand expression education strategy.

A leader in neonatal nursing, Mary Coughlin MS, NNP, RNC-E has pioneered the concept of trauma-informed care as a biologically relevant paradigm for hospitalized newborns, infants, and their families. An internationally recognized expert in the field of age-appropriate care, Ms. Coughlin has over 35 years of nursing experience beginning in the US Air Force Nurse Corp and culminating in her current role as President and Founder of Caring Essentials Collaborative. A published author of a myriad of manuscripts, chapters and textbooks, Ms. Coughlin has mentored close to 10,000 interdisciplinary NICU clinicians from over 14 countries to transform the experience of care for the hospitalized infant and family in crisis.

Wilai Rojjanasrirat, PhD, RN, IBCLC, FILCA, FAAN is a Professor and Director of Research and Scholarship at Graceland University’s School of Nursing in Independence, Missouri. Her background is in midwifery and maternal and child health nursing.

She is an international board certified lactation consultant. She earned her Bachelor’s in Nursing and Midwifery from Thailand and Master’s and Doctorate and Post-Doctorate in Nursing from the University of Kansas. She teaches in graduate nursing program. Her research focuses on promoting and supporting breastfeeding, psychometric development, and educational outcome evaluation.

Using telehealth in providing lactation support, evaluation of the breastfeeding outcomes among late-preterm, near term, and term infants, and evaluation of the Business Case for Breastfeeding Program’s impact among employed breastfeeding mothers in Kansas are among some of the research projects.

Dr. Rojjanasrirat has multiple publications and recently contributed to a book chapter on Employment and Breastfeeding in Wambach & Spencer, Breastfeeding and Human Lactation, 6th edition in 2021. She served as a former president of the Pi Eta Chapter of the Nursing Honor Society, a board member of the KC Board of Directors of Kansas City, Kansas, and a former president of the Greater Kansas City Lactation Consultant Association for several years.

Laurel Wilson, IBCLC, CLE, CCCE, CLD is a TEDx and international speaker, author, pregnancy and lactation expert, and consultant. She served as the Executive Director of Lactation Programs for CAPPA, the Childbirth and Postpartum Professional Association for 16 years and now is on the Senior Advisor Board. She served on the Board of Directors for the United States Breastfeeding Committee from 2016-2019. She also is on the Advisory Board for InJoy Health. She owns MotherJourney, focusing on training perinatal professionals on integrative and holistic information regarding pregnancy, childbirth, and breastfeeding. She has her degree in Maternal Child Health: Lactation Consulting and is an internationally board certified lactation consultant. As the co-author of two books, The Attachment Pregnancy and The Greatest Pregnancy Ever, original Editor of the CAPPA Lactation Educator Manual, and contributing author to Round the Circle: Doulas Talk About Themselves, she loves to blend today’s recent scientific findings with the mind/body/spirit wisdom. Laurel has been joyfully married to her husband for nearly three decades and has two wonderful grown sons, whose difficult births led her on a path towards helping emerging families create positive experiences. She believes that the journey into parenthood is a life-changing rite of passage that should be deeply honored and celebrated.

Professor Lisa Amir is a general practitioner and has been an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant since 1989. She is the author of over 120 peer-reviewed articles on breastfeeding. She works in breastfeeding medicine at The Royal Women’s Hospital in Melbourne, Australia. She is a Principal Research Fellow at Judith Lumley Centre, La Trobe University and is the Editor-in-Chief of the open access journal, International Breastfeeding Journal.

Liz Brooks is a private practice International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) and licensed lawyer, with expertise in criminal, administrative, non-profit, ethics, and lactation-related law. Liz offers in-home lactation consultations, and bedside care and teaching in two Baby-Friendly-designated hospitals.

She has been a leader in organizations for IBCLCs, breastfeeding promotion, and non-profit human milk banking. She authored the only textbook on legal and ethical issues for the IBCLC, and writes on health care ethics, equity, and conflict-of-interest in several books, blogs, and peer-reviewed journals.

She is a popular international conference speaker, offering practical tips with wit and wisdom for anyone who works with lactating and human milk-using families. Liz self-identifies as a cisgender hetero white woman with unearned privilege, and uses she/her/hers pronouns.