Breastfeeding has profound health benefits for both mothers and infants. Because of this, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends exclusive breastfeeding for the first 6 months of life and, in conjunction with the introduction of solid food through the first year. Despite recommendations, medical professionals only reach these goals roughly 50% of the time and 37% fall short of their personal goals. Early return-to-work requires both increasing lactation requirements and extended time away from one’s infant, which may contribute to early cessation breastfeeding. Our study explores variation in emergency medicine (EM) health care workers return-to-work and clinical scheduling and is guided by the following aims: Understand social process and behaviors associated with maternity leave planning and effect on return-to-work and lactation for health care workers in the emergency department (ED) Identify barriers and supports for supporting workplace lactation, wellness, and maternal health. Examine policies for maternity leave and return-to-work scheduling that facilitate women reaching their desired goals. Setting: Stanford University, Emory University. Participants: Individual interviews were conducted with 43 individuals who returned to work after giving birth within the last 3 years. Purposive sampling followed by snowball sampling was used to recruit participants. A qualitative study using constructivist grounded theory methodology was employed and selected because we viewed return-to-work and workplace lactation as social processes. Constant comparative analysis was performed utilizing data from individual interviews across three analytical stages of coding: initial, focused, theoretical. Initial line-by-line coding was done by two investigators to identify major themes. Following initial analysis, important themes were explored in subsequent interviews. Following development of the coding scheme, interviews underwent focused coding transitioning from categorical to conceptual ideas to provide guidance on ED return-to-work practices and patterns, while considering existing policies and social constructs. Theoretical coding was utilized to explore relationships and analytical memos to reflect researcher’s insights and questions regarding these codes. The goal was to create a conceptual model of barriers, supports and participant guided recommendations for improvement of return-to-work policies and supplement the initial study to expand regarding barriers to workplace lactation, and provide further supports, in addition to solutions to the complex social process that face female ED workers. Once coding was completed and themes were identified: return-to-work shift arrangements, culture surrounding leave, and policies and departmental supports, one final review of all transcripts was done to identify the average leave time (by departmental role) and participants ideal return-to-work. Health care workers in ED settings have an average return-to-work of 16 weeks, but desire closer to 25. Trainees have the least amount of leave time and require additional considerations for returning-to-work. Abbreviated leave times were identified as a significant barrier to continuation of workplace lactation in the ED and some mitigating approaches could include, return-to work policies that provide no nightshifts or no greater than three shift in a row for six weeks after returning to work.