Dr. Jack Newman graduated from the University of Toronto medical school in 1970, interning at the Vancouver General Hospital. He did his training in pædiatrics in Quebec City and then at the Hospital for Sick Children in Toronto from 1977-1981 to become a Fellow of the Royal College of Physicians of Canada in 1981 as well as Board Certified by the American Academy of Pediatrics in 1981. He has worked as a physician in Central America, New Zealand and as a paediatrician in South Africa. He founded the first hospital based breastfeeding clinic in Canada in 1984. He has been a consultant for UNICEF for the Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative, evaluating the first candidate hospitals in Gabon, the Ivory Coast and Canada.
Dr. Newman was a staff paediatrician at the Hospital for Sick Children emergency department from 1983 to 1992, and was, for a period of time, the acting chief of the emergency services. However, once the breastfeeding clinic started functioning, it took more and more of his time and he eventually worked full time helping mothers and babies with breastfeeding. He founded the International Breastfeeding Centre in Toronto where he and his staff see over 2,500 mothers and babies a year.
Dr. Newman has several publications on breastfeeding, and in 2000 published, along with Teresa Pitman, a help guide for professionals and mothers on breastfeeding, called, Dr. Jack Newman’s Guide to Breastfeeding, as it’s known in Canada (revised editions, January 2003 and January 2005, and a completely re-written version published in 2014), and The Ultimate Breastfeeding Book of Answers, as it’s known in the US (revised edition, November 2006). The book has been translated into French, Spanish, Indonesian and Japanese. In 2006, Dr. Newman, along with Teresa Pitman, published The Latch and Other Keys to Breastfeeding Success (Hale Publishing). This book is now out of print but available in French. He has also, along with Edith Kernerman, developed a DVD as a teaching tool for health professionals and mothers. It is available in English and French (on the same DVD). As well, it is subtitled in Spanish, Portuguese and Italian (on the same DVD). Dr Jack Newman’s Guide to Breastfeeding has now been completely revised and available since June 2014.
In July 2018, Dr Newman, along with his co-author Andrea Polokova, published Breastfeeding: empowering parents. It is available both as an eBook and a paperback.
His website www.ibconline.ca has a lot of information on breastfeeding and in particular video clips that help mothers understand breastfeeding better. For video clips with explanatory texts in English health providers can go to www.ibconline.ca .
In 2013, Dr Newman was awarded the Queen’s Jubilee Medal for service.
BirthKuwait Birth and Breastfeeding Conference 2018 