Guest Blog: Lauren Hogg

This week's guest blogger is Lauren Hogg—wife, mom, certified lactation counselor, and co-creator of LactSafe.
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If you have ever wondered which medications are safe to take during pregnancy or while nursing or pumping, LactSafe may be an answered prayer. Through a simple, streamlined app, you can search a medication's safety—including general info, common brand names, safety ratings, potential side effects, and effects on milk supply—and get a clear, research-backed answer in about 60 seconds.

As a doula, I get questions about medication safety all the time, so I was thrilled to connect with Lauren to learn more about what she is building and the impact her work is having on mothers every day.

1. Tell me about yourself.
Hi! I'm Lauren, a mom of three kiddos from Richmond, VA! My background is in anthropology, and since college, I have spent my professional life working at a non-profit and, for the past decade, for a breastfeeding and maternity e-commerce brand. I am also a Certified Lactation Counselor. I'm a homebirther, have been breastfeeding babies for almost 6 years now, and I'm a firm believer in making empowered and informed decisions for themselves and their families, especially when it comes to birthing and breastfeeding. When I'm not fully engrossed in parenting or work, I like to go for a walk in the woods, ride my bike, craft, or watch birds!

2. How/why did you build LactSafe?
LactSafe was built after a series of moments where I could have really used it. Each instance really pushed me to work with my husband to co-create the app.

Instance one: When my firstborn turned one, I had to have two major surgeries, and I remember vividly being concerned about whether certain medications were safe to take while breastfeeding and not really getting a clear answer. Some said pump and dump to be safe, others said it was fine. It was confusing.

Instance two: When I was pregnant with my third baby, I was given inaccurate advice from an EMT about which medications were safe to take while pregnant and breastfeeding for a sinus infection. I knew his advice was incorrect because I had been a CLC for years, and also had been working on LactSafe, so I was pretty familiar with the medications he was talking about. Nonetheless, I remember being so flabbergasted because if I hadn't had that background knowledge, what would I have done?

That experience led me to instance three, which is more of an ongoing pattern. As a CLC, I've heard so many times folks ask whether a certain medication is safe to take. As a CLC, the response is to check LactMed and talk to your provider. But from personal experience, when you're down bad with a sinus infection or recovering post-surgery, the last thing you have the capacity to do is read through a bunch of medical jargon when you really just want a clear answer on whether you can take this medication while breastfeeding. I've been in those situations, so I 100% get it. You're in so much pain, baby has to eat, and you don't want to give up on your breastfeeding goals. With my husband's help (he built the entire app from start to finish, and who I am co-creating with!), this is when we decided it was time to get LactSafe out into the world! 

My goal for this app is to be a tool that makes medication safety easier to understand and gives parents the confidence to start conversations with their providers, because I've also heard horror stories about people ending their breastfeeding journeys over medications that the research actually says are fine.

3. What is LactSafe's mission or main focus?
LactSafe's mission is to make evidence-based medication safety information easy, fast, and friendly for breastfeeding and pregnant families. Our vision is a world where every parent can make confident health decisions.

4. What are the best and most challenging parts of being an entrepreneur?
Time and energy! I hate that this is such a cliche answer, but as a working full-time parent with three very active kiddos, finding the time to really invest the energy I want into LactSafe has become really hard.

That said, remembering being postpartum and struggling to know if I could still breastfeed my baby post-surgery, and thinking about how I know I'm not the only one struggling with this problem, is what encourages me to keep going. I feel very passionate about this project, and I'm excited to dive back into LactSafe's mission now that the kids are back in school and we have a routine down. :)

5. Where do you see yourself and your business in 5 ­years?
Gosh, it would be an ultimate dream to have LactSafe become the resource providers automatically hand new parents, the way I wish someone had handed it to me. In 5 years I'd love for it to be trusted enough that it's just part of the standard of care, built out with tools like patient insights dashboard and custom provider builds, and known widely enough that no parent has to sit in that scary, confusing moment I was in wondering if they can still breastfeed. Ultimately, if this thing dies tomorrow I'd be happy just knowing it helped at least one other person in their lactation journey!

6. Who do you follow or admire in the breastfeeding/lactation community?
My midwife, Nancy. When I think back to my breastfeeding journey, she really encouraged me to keep going. I appreciate her keeping it real with me and telling me to stick it out. Breastfeeding is beautiful, but it can also be a labor of love and hard work. 100% worth it, but any breastfeeding person would be lying if they said it was all rainbows and sprinkles! Having that support system has been huge. 

7. Tell me about your most recent business win.
I recently launched a pilot for LactSafe for Providers and have been having providers sign up. To me, that shows there's a real need in this space and validates the reason LactSafe exists.

8. Please share any upcoming events or programs you will participate in, or any special offerings for new providers.
We are still offering an early sign-up beta program for providers! If you sign up, you'll get a custom URL referral link. We're also working on launching a patient insights dashboard and a custom build of LactSafe with your brand. More details to come on those latter two, but we are still accepting folks into the beta!