Expansion of the Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding into Neonatal Intensive Care

The World Health Organization/United Nations Children’s Fund Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative: Revised, Updated, and Expanded for Integrated Care (2009) identifies the need for expanding the guidelines originally developed for maternity units to include neonatal intensive care. For this purpose, an expert group from the Nordic countries and Quebec, Canada, prepared a draft proposal, which was discussed at an international workshop in Uppsala, Sweden, in September 2011. The expert group suggests the addition of 3 “Guiding Principles” to the Ten Steps to support this vulnerable population of mothers and infants:

1. The staff attitude to the mother must focus on the individual mother and her situation.

2. The facility must provide family-centered care, supported by the environment.

3. The health care system must ensure continuity of care, that is, continuity of pre-, peri-, and postnatal care and post-discharge care.

The goal of the expert group is to create a final document, the Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative for Neonatal Units, including standards and criteria for each of the 3 Guiding Principles, Ten Steps, and the Code; to develop tools for self-appraisal and monitoring compliance with the guidelines; and for external assessment to decide whether neonatal intensive/intermediate care units meet the conditions required to be designated as Baby-Friendly.

The documents will be finalized after consultation with the World Health Organization/United Nations Children’s Fund, and the goal is to offer these documents to international health care, professional, and other nongovernmental organizations involved in lactation and breastfeeding support for mothers of infants who require special neonatal care.