Thurrock Healthy Families have achieved BFI status stage 3 again. This has been accomplished due to the motivation, dedication and passion of all staff supporting infant feeding within the community.

Despite the challenges brought on by the pandemic, Healthy Families Team embraced the new ways of working using virtual technology, including practical skills reviews with staff and audits with mothers.

Infant feeding clinics were introduced for parents to have one to one support by appointment. This had a positive impact on the community with parents commenting; 

“Very supportive and helpful. Thank you!”

 

“I feel a lot better with breastfeeding and would recommend the service to help other mums with their breastfeeding journey.”

 

The team was highly commended in the report received from teh BFI assessors:

“NELFT Healthy Families Service has met all of the criteria for continued Baby Friendly accreditation and the staff are commended for their work to maintain the standards established. It was clear to the assessment team that new mothers receive a very high standard of care. 

The team of support workers are commended for their work in supporting mothers. Several mothers commented how grateful they were for the support.

The service has faced many challenges due to the Covid-19 pandemic. It is commendable that many of the Baby Friendly standards have been maintained and many adaptations and innovations have been introduced.”

One of the outcomes from the report is that the team were highly recommended to apply for the Gold award as a recognition of excellence.