IBCLC Detailed Content Outline: Clinical Skills Focused CERPs - Section VII

Maxine graduated with a nursing degree followed later on by her Master of Nursing in 2017 both from the University of Calgary. Maxine was a public health nurse in Calgary for 13 years, where providing face to face contacts with new families soon after discharge is a standard of care. Most families named feeding challenges as their biggest concern. In turn, Maxine developed a passion for lactation support, worked towards and attained the International Board-Certified Lactation Consultant designation, in order to assist families to reach their feeding goals.

In 2016, Maxine made the transition from public health to acute care where she currently works in all areas of a large Children’s hospital to support dyads with a myriad of lactation concerns but is primarily in the NICU. Maxine’s responsibilities includes orienting new staff to teaching a provincial lactation education within a team. Maxine is passionate about sharing knowledge with aspiring LCs and is a mentor to many. Maxine participates on numerous committees to update lactation and feeding policies, procedures and documents. Furthermore, she volunteers on provincial and national breastfeeding committees.

Michelle Pensa Branco MPH IBCLC is a lactation consultant and public health advocate. In addition to her clinical practice, which has included in-hospital, outpatient and private practice settings, she advocates for improved maternal-child health practices at the local, national and global level. She has a particular interest in the impact of trauma to breastfeeding families, models of peer support to improve breastfeeding outcomes and the application of health communication principles to the promotion and protection of breastfeeding. Michelle serves as the Director of Peer Support Programs and provides clinical lactation expertise for Nurture Project International, the only international NGO focused exclusively on infant feeding in emergencies. With Jodine Chase, she co-founded a Canadian non-profit organization, SafelyFed Canada. She is also an active member of the Ontario Public Health Association’s Breastfeeding Promotion Working Group. Michelle has previously served as the Vice-Chair of La Leche League Canada, the Communications Director for the Canadian Lactation Consultants Association as well as the Toronto Coordinator of INFACT Canada. When she is not travelling for work, Michelle stays close to home, living with her family just outside Toronto, Ontario, Canada.

Joy MacTavish, MA, IBCLC, RLC is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and certified Holistic Sleep Coach focusing on the intersections of infant feeding, sleep, and family well-being. Through her business, Sound Beginnings, she provides compassionate and evidence-based support to families in the greater Seattle area, and virtually everywhere else. She entered the perinatal field in 2007 as birth and postpartum doula, and childbirth and parenting educator. Joy holds a Master of Arts in Cultural Studies, graduate certificate in Gender, Women and Sexuality Studies, and two Bachelors degrees from the University of Washington. She enjoys combining her academic background, analytical skills, and passion for social justice into her personal and professional endeavors. Joy serves as an Advisory Committee Member and guest speaker for the GOLD Lactation Academy. When not working or learning, she can be found homeschooling, building LEGO with her children, or dreaming up her next big adventure.

Cynthia Good, MS Clinical Psychology, is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant, Clinical Counselor, author, consultant, and internationally recognized speaker. She is the Director of LifeCircle Consulting, LLC and is Certified in Acute Traumatic Stress Management. She is based in the Seattle, Washington, USA area, where she formerly served as an Adjunct Professor in the Department of Midwifery at Bastyr University where she taught counseling skills and is a therapist at Sandbox Therapy Group where she works with children, adults, and families. Cynthia has a strong interest in the emerging field of lactational psychology. She brings the evidence and insights of psychology and lactation consulting to her presentations, providing information and teaching skills that are essential to understanding and effectively responding to the complex psychosocial realities of families living in diverse contexts. The focus of her presentations includes communication skills and counseling techniques for perinatal care providers; equity, diversity, and inclusion; infant feeding rhetoric; perinatal mental health; perinatal loss, grief, and trauma; ethics; serving as an expert witness in lactation-related court cases; cultural competence and humility; vitamin D; and more.

Sarah Coutts is a registered nurse and lactation consultant with over 10 years experience in the neonatal intensive care unit. She currently is working as a Developmental Care Specialist in a NICU in Vancouver, Canada. Previous to this position Sarah was the Kangaroo Care Coordinator of an implementation science study to improve uptake of Kangaroo Care in NICUs in British Columbia. She is part of team of clinicians and researchers interested in understanding the barriers and enablers to Kangaroo Care from both the healthcare provider and parent perspectives and creating innovative strategies to increase knowledge and practice of Kangaroo Care in the NICU. She is passionate about raising awareness of the positive outcomes of zero separation between preterm and sick infants and their parents in the NICU.

Andini has bachelor and master degree in public health, majoring in hospital administration. She is an IBCLC and is currently undertaking PhD at the Australian National University. Her PhD thesis is looking at the facilitator and barrier of Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative implementation and accreditation in Indonesia and Australia. One part of her PhD was measuring its social value using Social Return on Investment.

Her journey began when she was pregnant with her first child, then found and attended full series of Indonesian Breastfeeding Mothers Association (AIMI)'s breastfeeding classes. She then decided to volunteered as breastfeeding counselor at AIMI.

With her work experience in hospital management consulting for 8 years and personal experience when her breastfed son undertook open heart surgery, she realized that not every hospitals provide adequate education and support for breastfeeding mother, either since pregnancy, during and after birth.

Andini was awarded Deeble Summer Research Scholarship from Deeble Institute for Health Policy Research Scholarship Program of Australian Healthcare and Hospitals Association (AHHA) in 2020 and published a Health Policy Issues Brief titled "Improving the Uptake of the Baby Friendly Health Initiative in Australian Hospitals" as the outcome. Thanks to her supervisor, Andini involved in working group for Breastfeeding Friendly Workplace Accreditation at ANU in 2018-2019 and involve in WBTi Australia since 2019. Currently living in Canberra Australia, Andini has been providing breastfeeding education and assistance for Indonesian mother-student, students' wives or any Indonesian women who live in Canberra.

A Canadian living in France for more than 25 years, Juanita discovered breastfeeding with her three children and has never looked back.
She became a La Leche League Leader in 1997, and served on the boards of LLL France 2004-2008 and LLL Europe 2011-2018. She has been the regional representative of LLL Europe to WABA since 2007. Juanita became a lactation consultant in 2003 (IBCLC), recertifying in 2008 and 2013.
Juanita was the coordinator for the Journée Internationale de l’Allaitement (‘JIA’ – International Breastfeeding Conference for health professionals organized by LLL France) in 2003 and 2008. She helped create and implement the Peer Counsellor Programme in France (Programme relais allaitement- Prall).
The WHO Code is one of her passions! She has spoken on the Code at conferences around the world. Member of the Coordination française pour l’allaitement maternel (CoFam) since 2007, she was head of the Task Force on the Code and ethical questions. As a member of IBFAN *and GIFA, she was given the opportunity to participate in international meetings of the Codex Alimentarius and the OECD in Paris, as well as in week-long IBFAN conferences in Montecatini, Italy in 2007, and in Geneva in 2008. She also attended the Committee on the Convention on Rights of the Child in Geneva for IBFAN and helped prepare a country report on France underlining the importance of breastfeeding and the need to apply the Code (2009). She is an active member of IBFAN’s Global Working Group on Contaminants in Breastmilk. In 2018, she represented LLLI at the second NetCode meeting in Geneva.

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.

Lucy is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) Holistic Sleep Coach (HSC), public speaker, and author on the topic of lactation. She is also a qualified counsellor, child and is qualified in child development and child psychology.

Lucy runs a small but thriving Private Practice based on the South Coast of the UK but sees clients internationally. As a single mother of two boys who were hard to breastfeed, and as someone with ADHD, Lucy truly understands the highs and lows of parenthood both for neurotypical families and those who may have additional challenges.

Lucy’s approach is strongly underpinned by the belief that parents are the only true expert on their child, and that parental instinct is rarely wrong. Lucy uses listening and counselling skills first and foremost in her work, and prides herself on striving to provide a safe and inclusive space for everyone.

Elizabeth M. Johnson, MA is a trauma educator and peer support advocate in private practice. She helps people understand how sexual abuse affects sexual and reproductive health. She looks at how sexual abuse affects breastfeeding for example but also how traditional sex education ignores issues like how past abuse affects consent, teen pregnancy and risky behavior. Using a trauma lens, Elizabeth talks about everything sexual health related from Asking (about abuse) to Z(zzzz's) and everything in between. Elizabeth is the only educator in the world specializing in training and consulting on this topic.

In addition to training, speaking and consulting, Elizabeth has facilitated a free, weekly peer support group for sexual abuse survivors for over three years. She holds a Masters of Arts degree in Womens Studies from Southern Connecticut State University. Elizabeth identifies as a rape survivor and has worked with survivors since 2005. She lives in Durham, NC with her family.