Lactation & Breastfeeding Online Course(s) & Continuing Education

Dr. Ilana Azulay Chertok is a Professor and Associate Director of Nursing Research and Scholarship at the Ohio University, College of Health Sciences and Professions, School of Nursing. She earned her bachelor’s in international relations and nursing, master’s in nursing, doctorate (PhD) in epidemiology, and post-doctorate in nursing research. The primary focus of her research is national and global maternal-infant health, specifically lactation and breastfeeding research. She has published and presented her work in national and international journals, conferences, and other professional forums. Dr. Chertok has served as a mentor to undergraduate students, graduate students, and health professionals of various disciplines including nursing, medicine, and public health. Currently, she is the lead PI on a study examining the differences in breastfeeding and breast milk between women with and without gestational diabetes mellitus.

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.

Bonnie Holt Logsdon (she/her), is a Registered Dietitian, International Board Certified Lactation Consultant, and Certified Lactation Educator™ through CAPPA, and a DONA-trained birth doula with over 18 years of experience in community-based practice.

In her private practice, Bonnie Knows Breast, she blends her nutrition and lactation work to support families during the prenatal and postpartum periods. Bonnie also mentors IBCLC candidate students, teaches the Certified Lactation Educator (CLE) course, and offers public speaking on lactation and nutrition-related topics.

Bonnie is committed to giving personalized, affirming care and education to each family, individual, and professional she works with! Supporting families during this critical and emotional time in their lives is such important work. Bonnie promises compassionate, non-judgmental support and information.

Bonnie and her husband Brent, have a 7-year-old son, Finley. They enjoy quality time together playing board games, cooking, traveling, and hiking in as many National Parks as possible.

The mission of Bonnie Knows Breast is to empower people with education to make informed decisions related to their health and the health of their babies. Bonnie supports families of all backgrounds, structures, and identities and believes everyone deserves to be supported in their journey.

Micaela Notarangelo, PhD, IBCLC, RLC, obtained her IBCLC certification in 2010. She has a private lactation consultant practice in Lerici, Italy and takes a particular interest in everything that concerns breastfeeding science and medicine. From 1992 to 2001, Micaela lived in Japan, where in 1998 she earned a PhD in Economics at Hokkaido University, Sapporo. She also worked as assistant professor at Hokkaido University and Utrecht University. After returning to Italy, she became a La Leche League Leader in 2005 and was the Area Professional Liaison of LLL Italy from 2010 to 2013. In 2017, together with Chiara Toti, IBCLC, Micaela has developed a new two-day course for health care providers about breastfeeding support for babies with lip and/or palate cleft. The course has been held, with the financial support of Aismel, a parents' association, in several major Italian hospitals.

Jada Wright Nichols is an Atlanta-based women’s wellness consultant. She graduated from Tennessee State University, with a bachelor’s degree in speech pathology and audiology. She has a master’s degree in occupational therapy and has worked in a variety of rehabilitation settings, across the life-span.

Additionally, she is a massage therapist, lymphedema therapist, holistic nutritionist, birth and postpartum doula, yoga instructor, and international board-certified lactation consultant (IBCLC). She is a lactation consultant at Children’s Healthcare of Atlanta, and the owner of Blossom Health and Maternal Wellness, and Bloom Early Intervention, which provide in-home and virtual services for new and expectant families, as they navigate various aspects of parenting, access, and equity.

Dr. Kendall-Tackett is a health psychologist and International Board Certified Lactation Consultant, and the Owner and Editor-in-Chief of Praeclarus Press, a small press specializing in women's health. Dr. Kendall-Tackett is Editor-in-Chief of the journal, Psychological Trauma and was Founding Editor-in-Chief of Clinical Lactation, a position she held for 11 years. She is Fellow of the American Psychological Association in Health and Trauma Psychology, Past President of the APA Division of Trauma Psychology, and a member of APA’s Publications and Communications Board.

Courtney Polk is a registered nurse and International Board Certified Lactation Consultant. She is a native of New Orleans but currently resides in Dallas, Texas with her husband and their 2 children. Since graduating from Southern University School of Nursing in 2006, Courtney began her nursing career in labor and delivery and went on to earn a masters in nursing education in 2012. It wasn’t until having her son in 2014, and experiencing breastfeeding for herself that lactation became her focus and passion. Since becoming board certified she has helped countless families in the Dallas-Ft. Worth metroplex area meet or exceed their breastfeeding goals. Courtney is also the current president of the Dallas Lactation Consultant Association.

Ruth Patterson is Cloud Nine's P I O N E E R & Most Sought Lactation Specialist with 33 years of rich experience - currently practicing at Jayanagar C9, Bangalore-India and a visiting Lactation Consultant with 9 other Cloud Nine branches locally. She also heads the 24 Pan India Cloud Nine Hospitals as the Manager Lactation.

Ruth's 30+ years of rich experience includes maternity, allied health and nursing care, both in rural and urban sector in India & Abroad. Her exclusive 18 years of experience in Lactation services, she has acquired immense practical knowledge in the last decade to identify most critical disorders of mother and babies during breastfeeding stage. She is acclaimed to have expertise in a lesser-known art of re-lactation and induced lactation.

Ruth is known for her ability to identify the most critical issues in Breastfeeding and restore/re-initiate feeds. She is acclaimed for the use of Dynamic Taping (only available at Jayanagar C9) that arrests/prevents breast surgery/abscess. This Dynamic Taping practice, alongside, a Gynecologist, Pediatrician and Physiotherapist at Cloud Nine, is patented.

Ruth is a well sought out person for patient hearing and provides her expert comments in News columns/Media and also delivers guest lectures.

Dr. Shazia Shadab (PT) is the HOD of the Cloud nine physiotherapist department (PAN-India). She has 10 years experience and has been exceptional in her career with constant learning of new skills and improvising in her services.

She has multiple articles published in acclaimed newspapers and many international certifications affiliated with her name like pelvic girdle dysfunction, labor mechanism, and has done basic advanced certification in dynamic tapping to name a few. She also has pursued her post-graduation in research methodology after her bachelor's in physiotherapy.

She has always been keen to learn how to progress in a variety of different treatment approaches to find better results. This has helped her and her team to develop an intervention to prevent breast abscess with no surgical approach and has been granted a patent on "a device to promote feeding and scar-free treatment of breast abscess treatment during lactation". She has worked along with professionals like Dr. Kishore Kumar, Dr. Prakash Kini, and Ruth Patterson, and has treated more than 100 patients suffering from breast abscesses without any surgical intervention. This would be an exceptional resource to help and provide better care.

She has extensive expertise in not only treating but also preventing multiple musculoskeletal conditions during pregnancy and postpartum. She has been awarded the ABCD (Above and Beyond the Call on Duty) Award for her unwavering and selfless dedication to her patients.

Kristin is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker and IBCLC in private practice in central NJ. Her practice specialties are low supply, maternal and infant mental health, and the intersection of ethnicity, sexual orientation, and gender in the care of the new family. She has spoken on various lactation, mental health, and equity topics for USLCA, the Lehigh Valley Breastfeeding Association Conference, the Appalachian Breastfeeding Conference, LPPEC, LC in PP, and for LLL of the Garden State. She designed and taught a training course on Mental Health First Aid for Perinatal Providers. She has been a featured speaker on several lactation related podcasts.

She is the mother of two children who nursed full term despite maternal IGT, and who are now 16 and 13. She is an anti racist LGBT+ activist, a member of transformative works fandoms, and makes fighting for a better world part of her daily life.

Rania Abdou is a Pediatrics and neonatology consultant at Faculty of medicine, Ain shams university where she teaches Pediatrics and neonatology courses. She earned a Diploma in the clinical nutrition from the European society for clinical nutrition and metabolism. Dr. Rania is also a certified international lactation consultant since 2013. She has dedicated much of her time to the improvement of breastfeeding practice between Egyptian women. Previously, she worked as a clinical director of the neonatal intensive care unit of ain shams university pediatric hospital and vice-director of the pediatrics department at the ain shams specialized university hospital.