Does the title mean anything here?
5 states require a licence, 2 run an optional state certification, and Georgia passed a law that was struck down. Everywhere else the words are unregulated.
Open dataset · checked
Before you book a lactation consultant, check what the title means in your state
Only 5 states require a licence to practise. In 44 of the 51 US jurisdictions we found no requirement of any kind, so anyone may use the title — and in Arizona, Florida and North Carolina, a board-certified consultant who is not a nurse cannot bill Medicaid at all.
4 of 6
states that have ever passed a lactation licensing law are missing or wrong on the national professional body’s own tracker, dated 2023.Checked against each state on ; Massachusetts rests on secondary reporting. See the comparison
Connecticut
Checked against the state’s own law
- Licence to practise
- Licence requiredsince 2026-07-01
- Medicaid billing · consultant who is not a nurse
- Not checked yet
- Lactation providers per 10,000 births
- 32.4rank 19 of 51US overall 27.9 · marked on the bar
9,782
lactation providers in the federal provider registry
NPPES · captured 2026-09-10
27.9
providers per 10,000 births, US overall
NPPES ÷ NCHS births
11.9×
as many per birth in Vermont as in Mississippi
Same two sources
27/51
jurisdictions with a researched Medicaid billing position
State records · 2026-09-11
Coverage map
See where the rules and the help actually are
Colour every state by provider supply, by licensing or by Medicaid billing. Pick a legend item to single those states out.
Providers: NPPES — National Plan and Provider Enumeration System (CMS), captured 2026-09-10. Births: NCHS VSRR — provisional live births by state, 2023. Licensing and Medicaid: state records, checked 2026-09-11. Provider counts are enrolment, not a credential check — what these numbers are and are not.
What decides the help you get
Three questions, answered from the record
Can anyone bill for it?
Federal law says most plans must cover lactation support with no copay. The catch is the in-network rule — and in Arizona, Florida and North Carolina a board-certified consultant who is not a nurse cannot bill Medicaid at all.
Is there anyone near you?
27.9 lactation providers per 10,000 births nationally — but Vermont has 11.9× as many per birth as Mississippi.
Tracker audit
What the national tracker gets wrong
The national professional body’s own licensure tracker is dated 2023. Of the 6 states that have ever passed a lactation licensing law, it gets 4 wrong.
| State | The tracker says | The state’s record says |
|---|---|---|
| Georgia | Listed as a licensing state | Its law was struck down in court |
| New Mexico | IBCLC-only licensure | Licensed, and several certifications are accepted |
| Connecticut | Not listed | Licence in effect since 2026-07-01 |
| Massachusetts | Not listed | Licence in effect since 2024-11-21 — reported, not yet verified against the statute |
Separately, New Hampshire and Washington regulate by voluntary certification rather than licensure. A licensure list is right to leave them off — which is exactly why you will not find them on one.
What we are not
Not a directory of names — a record of what the name means
We are not a national directory of lactation consultants, and we will not become one — the certifying board’s registry answers exact-match lookups only, so nobody can build a verified national list, us included. Where a state publishes its own licence register we republish it and say when we checked: 96 currently-licensed practitioners in Connecticut.
Everywhere else, the honest answer is that you can check a credential yourself in about a minute and do not need us to do it.
Free: a week of feeding and sleep log pages
Printable, one page per day, designed to be filled in one-handed at 3am — feeds, nappies and sleep, so you have something concrete to show your pediatrician or IBCLC. No email needed.
For lactation consultants and the services that bill for them
Where you can practise, and whether you will be paid
The same two questions decide it, and the answers are scattered across 51 agencies. We have researched the Medicaid position in 27 of them so far, from the point of view of a consultant who is not a nurse.
- Can bill directly
- 11
- Only through another provider
- 11
- No route to bill
- 3