How To Safely Store Breast Milk: Storage And Thawing
Storing breast milk properly ensures your baby gets safe mother's milk even when you can't breastfeed directly. Here's when you'll need to store breast milk:
- Baby admitted in hospital. Doctors need mother's milk for the baby. It helps early recovery of the baby. Mothers need to express 8-12 times a day to maintain their milk supply to keep up with the baby's demand.
- Increase milk production. Frequently expressing breast milk helps boost your milk production.
- Working mother. Express in between breastfeeding sessions and while at your job. Store this extra milk. Caregivers can feed it to your baby with a paladai (a small cup-like spoon).
- Donate your extra milk left after breastfeeding. Express and store it. Donate to your local Human Milk Bank, where it will be used to treat sick newborns.
Learn how to express breast milk using hand expression or breast pump.
How to store breast milk?
Collect your milk in a sterilized small steel container with a lid.
- Less than 4 hours. Store at a clean place at room temperature (up to 25°C).
- Within 24 hours. Store in the back of your refrigerator (at 4°C or colder). Do not store in the door of your fridge because its temperature fluctuates when someone opens the door.
- More than 24 hours. You will need a deep freezer capable of storing at -20°C. You can safely store breast milk for 3 months at -20°C in deep freezer. Label the container with date of expressing before storing for long term. Use the earliest stored milk first.
Never store leftover formula milk.
How to melt (thaw) frozen breast milk?
Frozen breast milk needs to be melted (thawed) properly before feeding. Thawing means melting the frozen milk safely without heating it directly.
Overnight in refrigerator
The safest method is to move frozen milk to the refrigerator the night before. It will melt slowly and can be used within 24 hours.
Warm water bath
- Fill a pan with lukewarm water (35-40°C) and place the container of frozen milk in it.
- Keep the water level below the container's lid to prevent contamination.
- You can replace with fresh warm water if needed, but do not heat the pan on a stove.
- Once melted, gently swirl the container to mix the milk.
- Use melted milk within 1-2 hours at room temperature or within 24 hours if kept in the refrigerator. Never refreeze melted breast milk.
- You may notice tiny fat lumps floating on the top of this milk. This is normal. Gently swirl to mix.
Do not thaw or heat breast milk in a microwave or by direct heating on a stove. This destroys nutrients and can create hot spots that may burn your baby's mouth.
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Learn how to feed expressed breast milk to your baby using a paladai (spoon).
Storing does not decrease the nutrition and health benefits of your breast milk. That's why expressed breast milk is the best choice when direct breastfeeding is not possible. Happy breastfeeding!
Know more about storage and preparation of breast milk – CDC Guidelines.