Phytotherapy of lactation impairment – evidence based medicine and usage safety

Abstract

Some women after childbirth are struggling with the problem of producing too little milk and cannot feed the child only on breast milk. Therefore, they need to introduce synthetic milk into newborn’s diet or to look for a way to increase their lactation. Breast milk provides the newborn with optimal supply of nutrients, increases its immunology and has a positive effect on its further development. The lack of a synthetic drug which can increase the lactation in nursing women prompts them to turn to the phytotherapy. A large part of medicinal plants aimed at increasing lac-tation in breastfeeding women is used as traditional medicinal products. There is, however, very few studies involving breast-feeding mothers confirming the lactagogic action of the plant or carried out with newborns confirming that there is no trace of the drug in breast milk or, if there is, it shows an appropriate safety profile for such a small child.The purpose of this review was to check which medicinal plants, commonly considered galactogogues, have clinically proven activities and whether their safety profile has already been tested for both the nursing mother and her child.