What are the causes of red and swollen nipples?

The nipple is a protruding tissue in the center of the breast. It contains many capillaries and mammary duct outlets. It is an important part of milk secretion. Babies get milk through the nipple. The health of nipples is very fragile and can be easily affected by various factors and become ill. For example, many women will experience red and swollen nipples. Let’s take a look at the causes of red and swollen nipples.

Breast redness, swelling, heat and pain are typical clinical manifestations of inflammation. If redness, swelling, heat and pain occur in the breast, it is very likely that you have an inflammatory disease of the breast, such as acute mastitis, mammary duct ectasia syndrome, etc. In addition, you should also be alert to the possibility of inflammatory breast cancer.

1. Bacterial invasion:

The pathogenic bacteria of this disease are mostly Staphylococcus aureus, and a few are Streptococci. Bacteria enter through the cracks in the nipple skin or the chapped areola, spread along the lymphatic vessels to the fat and fibrous tissue between the mammary lobules and the glandular lobules, causing acute suppurative cellulitis of the breast. There are also a few cases where postpartum infection complications occur in other parts of the body, and the bacteria spread to the breast through the blood circulation, causing the disease.

2. Milk stasis:

Breast milk facilitates the growth of invading bacteria. Causes of milk stasis include:

① The nipples are too small or inverted and are not corrected in time before birth, making it difficult for the baby to suck milk or even unable to breastfeed.

② Excessive milk and incomplete emptying. The mother does not understand the secretion of milk, and the excess milk cannot be discharged in time and is retained in the breast.

③ Blockage of the milk ducts makes it difficult to discharge milk. Inflammation, tumors and external compression of the milk ducts themselves can all affect normal breastfeeding.

3. Nipple cracks:

After delivery, if the mother fails to master the correct breastfeeding technique, or the baby's sucking is abnormal, or if irritants such as soap or ethanol desiccant are used excessively on the nipples, or if the baby's oral motor function is disordered, nipple fissures may occur, allowing bacteria to invade through the small cracks in the nipple and reach the subcutaneous and interlobular tissues through the lymphatic vessels to cause infection. When the nipples are cracked, breastfeeding is painful and the milk cannot be fully sucked out, causing milk stasis and creating conditions for the reproduction of invading bacteria.