Lancashire applauded for ‘gold’ standard baby friendly care
HCRG Care Group, Lancashire County Council and Families and Babies (FAB) have been recognised for the fourth year running for offering outstanding baby friendly care to families.
UNICEF, which runs the Baby Friendly Initiative, has revalidated gold standard to Lancashire Healthy Young People and Families Service (run by HCRG Care Group), the Children and Family Wellbeing Service (Lancashire County Council’s response to Early Help), and Families and Babies (FAB) which provides peer support for infant feeding.
The UNICEF programme helps professionals to provide sensitive and effective care and support for mothers, enabling them to make informed choices about feeding their babies.
In the revalidation report, the Lancashire services were commended for their pride, enthusiasm, and commitment to drive improvements, increase quality and innovate.
It recognised the collaborative working across organisations and stated that the Baby Friendly standards are clearly a at the forefront of continuously driving improvement the care for babies, their mothers and families.
Michelle Lee, Regional Director at HCRG Care Group, which runs Lancashire Healthy Young People and Families Service, said: “To have gold standard revalidated four years on the run is an incredible achievement. It is testament to the hard work our teams have done to embed best practice in baby friendly care across Lancashire, which has made a really positive difference to the families that we support.”
Dr Sakthi Karunanithi, director of public health, Lancashire County Council, said: “We are delighted to have achieved the highest level of the UNICEF Baby Friendly Gold award and celebrate our sustained commitment and partnership approach in supporting infant feeding and parent-infant relationships across Lancashire.
“Helping mothers to be empowered, and developing close and loving relationships with their babies is a key part of ensuring our children get the very best start in life and improve health and wellbeing outcomes.”
Elaine Edwards, Chair of Trustees at Families and Babies (FAB), said: “The FAB team are immensely proud of the contribution we were able to make towards the gold reaccreditation. It was a privilege to be part of the wider team supporting the breastfeeding families across Lancashire.”
Pictured, l-r: Michelle Lee, Regional Director at HCRG Care Group; Cllr Shaun Turner; Cllr Michael Green; Katie Wharton, Infant Feeding Coordinator/BFI Lead – Lancashire; and Cllr Cosima Towneley
