While the benefits of breastfeeding for the baby are well established and some studies have shown that mothers who breastfeed have lower risks of diabetes, high cholesterol and heart disease, a new study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology shows that breastfeeding may also have another benefit for the mother. Low risk of high blood pressure
This new study, led by Dr. Alison M. Stuebe from the University of North Carolina, was designed to look for a possible connection between breastfeeding and the development of high blood pressure in mothers.
Researchers looked at 56,000 U.S. women that were a part of the Nurses’ Health Study II. Each participant had given birth to at least one child. They discovered that 8,900 women developed high blood pressure, but women who had not breastfed their child were 22 percent more likely to develop high blood pressure than those mothers that had breastfed for at least six months
