The Physiotherapy Assessment and Treatment of Breastfeeding Related Conditions (Maternal and Infant factors) were truly wonderful courses. Mercedes is a knowledgable and passionate instructor, who brings evidence based and practical information to her courses. The information from this course can be immediately applied to your clinical practice, allowing you to integrate breastfeeding support into toolbox of skills. As a physiotherapist that has been practicing for nearly 10 years, I have taken many courses to further my skills - I can honestly say that these courses were among the best I have taken!
Nicole Stieber-Sze
Physiotherapist
I have been doing the lactating breast work since fall 2017 and had offered few mini classes in the past for both public and professionals. This course definitely deepened the knowledge and gave me a great deal of confidence to myself and my work about lactation support as a manual therapist. I am much more confident in talking about my work to people, in a much clearer way.
Basically until this course, I was doing things that I believed it was helpful, but I wasn’t able to explain it well and was very very insecure about it.
Akari Yokokawa
Massage Therapist & Acupuncturist
I am a midwifery student, with a maternity and community nursing background. I decided to take Mercedes' courses on infant feeding and breast/chest health, because in my education and practice I had found there is a lot of conflicting, confusing and harmful advice provided to new parents regarding feeding their babies. I read the course description describing evidence based approaches to feeding, signed up and hoped for the best.
The best is what I got! I was completely moved by this course and Mercedes dedication to supporting individuals, families and communities in their feeding journeys. Her ability to deliver evidence based feeding education with humor, anecdotes, case studies, and to faciliate the use of class participant knowledge base for learning opportunities is marvelous. Mercedes is not only an experienced and skilled clinician with a somewhat alarming memory for anatomy and physiology- she is also a talented adult educator whose curriculum design displays thoughtfulness for adult learners who must both learn new content and unlearn un-informed habits. The integration of up to date pain science theory and a bio-psychosocial approach to assessment and care was unprecedented in years of formal health care provider education in my experience and it has completely changed my practice and benefited many of my clients since. I am not exaggerating when I describe this course as life changing.
As a LGBTQ person, I also appreciated the attention to chest feeding and language, as well as the the acknowledgement/support for diverse family structures within the course content. The learning environment was supportive, calm, and positive. We had fun, and learned. I highly recommend this course to other midwifery and nursing professionals who want to improve their practice.
Sarah Reaburn
Midwifery Student
"In 10 years of pediatric practice, this was the best continuing education course I’ve ever taken! I wish I had signed up for the maternal component as well – I did not think it would be relevant to me, but it definitely was!’’
"Loved, loved and loved! Every single pediatric and pelvic floor physiotherapist should take this course!’’
"I loved the fact that physiotherapists now can assist moms and babies that are struggling with breastfeeding.’’
"I really enjoyed having moms come in with their babies – it was such a great learning experience.’’
"Mercedes is an extremely good teacher who it is easy to trust the experienced knowledge and feedback, and make a day go by covering everything that needs to be covered in such a way that it goes by very quickly and it is over already.’’