Unfortunately, the demand for our program sometimes outstrips our ability to see patients.

Infant feeding support ideally needs to happen now, not weeks later. Unfortunately, wait times for our clinic range from 1 to 10 weeks, depending on the referral volume.

While our team is working diligently to increase access for patients and shorten wait times, the delay is largely caused by the shortage of physicians skilled in this area of work in Edmonton. Currently, Northern Alberta is served by 6 physicians fully trained as breast and infant feeding experts, while Calgary alone has more than 20. Edmonton and Northern Alberta require the same number of physicians, if not more, to ensure wait times reach the gold standard of less than a week. Despite this significant limitation, our office has helped thousands of dyads reach their feeding goals and continues to advocate for developing and expanding our program and programs like ours.

What makes a lactation & infant feeding clinic like Willow Family Medicine special?

Not only does a lactation & infant feeding clinic look after an infant, but the primary feeding parent and the two of them together. We recognize patients are complex, and the challenges they face are multifactorial, impacted not only by their physical or medical conditions but social and psychological factors. Clinics like Willow Family Medicine offer much more than just feeding support or procedural interventions; they also cover the science of lactation, breast/body feeding medicine, postpartum care, reproductive health, general pediatrics, mental health, and infant feeding.

Patients who access collaborative, continuous, and comprehensive care from the beginning are more likely to achieve better outcomes with greater ease, less cost, and psychological burden. Below are a few things to consider while you wait for such care or seek care elsewhere.

In keeping with the recommendations of the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine, we encourage patients to access care from providers who hold the following designations:

  1. International Board Certified Lactation Consultant (IBCLC) and/or

  2. North American Board Of Breastfeeding And Lactation Medicine (NABBLM-C)

  3. A Medical Doctor (MD) or Nurse Practitioner (NP)

    OR

  4. Registered Nurse (RN) IBCLC with direct collaboration with an MD/NP IBCLC

Many other types of clinics and support (e.g., CLCs, LPNs, RNs) exist in Edmonton and can be accessed, often at a financial cost to patients, with limited to no waiting for patients. A list can be found here. While these clinics can be helpful in normalizing breast/chestfeeding and providing foundational knowledge, they are often unable to support patients fully as they cannot diagnose or follow medical conditions, refer to specialists, order investigations, prescribe medications, or, if indicated, perform procedures such as frenectomy, abscess drainage, or obstructed milk pore excision.

The management of breast/chestfeeding, lactation, infant feeding, and nutrition is an area of medical expertise, and as such, non-MD providers should work in collaboration with a senior medical professional in the same way a patient diagnosed with diabetes would be referred to a clinic that supports diabetes. This would include an interdisciplinary team of doctors, nurses, and other allied health providers in the Alberta province. A family struggling to feed their baby, one of the first developmental milestones of an infant’s life, deserves specialist care and attention.

When considering accessing other providers, we recommend patients review the following website to ensure their provider can provide appropriate care that is well suited to their needs. However, it is often hard for families to know their needs or how complex they are, and often, the other physician options in Edmonton also have long wait times. As such, patients can consider accessing support in Calgary at one of the three physician-led clinics (e.g. Riley Park, Well Fed, or Circle Medical). This is where Dr. MacGregor received her early training, and the support received at these clinics share a similar philosophy and approach to Willow Family Medicine. The wait times at these Calgary clinics may be shorter due to the large number of providers. Another physician-led option is Dr. Adina McBain at The KneeHill Medical Clinic of Three Hills, Alberta. Dr. MacGregor and her team will always assume care once a patient’s appointment date occurs, regardless of who they have visited previously.

Patients may consider obtaining a skilled assessment by a Dentist or Speech-Language Pathologist (services typically not covered by Alberta Health) to provide clarification on the functional components of infant feeding; however, this should be done in conjunction with comprehensive support of both breast/chestfeeding parent and child. In an ideal clinical scenario, a community-based lactation and infant nutrition clinic would include an interdisciplinary team of family physicians certified as International Board Certified Lactation Consultants, registered nurses, speech-language pathologists, dentists, dietitians, psychologists, pediatricians, social workers, psychiatrists and physiotherapists with access to pediatric otolaryngologists and dentists as required. Unfortunately, this ideal collaborative clinic does not exist under one roof in Alberta but rather as a disjointed network accessible through referrals from clinics like Willow Family Medicine. Regardless of the support you seek, when choosing a provider, especially when paying out-of-pocket, it may be helpful to ask:

  1. What type of follow-up will I receive? Is there a time or complexity limit to this follow-up?

  2. What does this provider do if issues are too complex? Who do they refer to for help? How long will this take?

  3. Can this provider support the primary feeding parent as well as the infant? Breast/chestfeeding and infant nutrition have three patients: the primary feeding parent, the child, and the dyad as a unit. All parties should be resourced and supported as needed.

While the drive to Calgary may be less ideal, feeding challenges are often far more complicated than they initially appear and/or require more skill than can be provided by non-infant feeding experts. Further, the financially lucrative nature of private pay frenectomy (on average costing patients $500-$1000 in a private pay clinic versus the $38-$150 paid to a physician by Alberta Health) along with the severe lack of physician providers in Edmonton, encourages less skilled providers to “fill” the care gap. These patients often visit Willow worse off than if they had waited and received care in Calgary. While there are many patients who do well seeking non-physician-led care, outcomes vary drastically from patient to patient and from family to family. You are the only person who knows the right decision for you, your child, and your family. It is our hope the above discussion will help you make an informed decision that feels right for you.

If contemplating private pay frenectomy, a few recommended providers are as follows. Please note that our clinic is always willing to follow patients after the completion of laser frenectomies. If you would like to arrange this care, please ensure a referral is sent by your provider.

Thank you for your patience as we work hard towards establishing a robust, evidence-based lactation and infant feeding network in Northern Alberta.

The Willow Family Medicine team/members hold membership(s) and/or professional affiliation(s) to the above organization(s).

The Willow Family Medicine team/members hold membership(s) and/or professional affiliation(s) to the above organization(s).