Prolacta donors reside in the U.S. and make an informed decision to donate their extra breast milk to help vulnerable infants. Each donor produces excess breast milk beyond what their own infant can consume.
These carefully screened donors collect, freeze, and ship their excess breast milk to Prolacta. That breast milk is processed into pasteurized 100% human milk–based nutritional products with essential minerals added for low-birth-weight premature infants.
We maintain the highest quality and safety standards in the human milk industry to protect the medically fragile infants we serve. This begins with our stringent qualification standards for donors.
Read more about our screening process.
Donors complete the qualification process and are educated on best practices for safely collecting and storing their breast milk before they are eligible to send donations. Their donated milk undergoes more than 20 tests for the screening of human milk to ensure quality and safety. Click here to view the complete screening, testing, and qualification criteria for each donation.
To protect the health of extremely vulnerable infants, each human milk donor must follow strict quality and safety instructions when pumping, cleaning and sanitizing pump parts, storing milk and shipping milk donations. These activities take 2 to 8 hours a day on average and Prolacta compensates for their time and effort.
Read more about what it takes to donate.
Depending on her preference, a donor can choose the program that best meets her needs. One program compensates donors directly and the other program makes donations to the NICU Parent Network on their behalf.
Many of our donors tell us that their donation experience gives them a real sense of purpose and pride. Many donors have reported having a connection to Prolacta’s mission because of a family member’s experience with critically ill or premature infants.
Our program also benefits the donor’s children’s wellbeing. Donor moms who receive compensation donate for about 4 months longer than non-compensated donors, which often results in breastfeeding their own children for longer. 1
Prolacta’s donor milk program is fully aligned with the WHO and UNICEF program goals on supporting exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months and continued breastfeeding up to 2 years and beyond.
Throughout their donation journey, we work to ensure donors have the resources and information needed to make the process of donating as straightforward and rewarding as possible. Prolacta donors motivate, encourage, support, and inspire one another within the community we’ve provided for them.
Because parental leave options are limited in the US, compensated breast milk donation gives donors the ability to take additional time off from work after having a baby. Some donors also use their compensation to contribute to their families for things such as a down payment for their home, tuition for themselves or their children, and many other benefits.
We simply could not do what we do for critically ill and premature infants without our donors exclusively based in the US. That’s why we celebrate our donors at our all-employee meetings and send appreciation gifts for reaching milestones during their time donating. Their passion is irresistible, so we work closely with our breast milk donors to raise awareness during events such as World Prematurity Day, Breastfeeding Awareness Week, Human Milk Donation Day, and many others.
