Family help design information booklet for NICU parents

A couple whose baby was born at just 24 weeks have helped design a booklet to increase breast feeding rates for babies who have been cared for on the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU).

The booklet “Infant feeding on the neonatal unit”, is part of the First Drops initiative, a quality improvement project which aims to increase rates of parents whose baby has been admitted to NICU, expressing breast milk as soon as possible after birth. This in turn enables more babies to be discharged home breast feeding or receiving breast milk.

The Neonatal Infant Feeding team identified that in order to improve rates of babies being discharged breastfeeding they needed to improve care provided to women and birthing parents to enable them to express their milk as soon as possible following their baby’s admission to NICU. Suzy Goodfellow and Susan Harris, Neonatal Nurses and Baby Friendly Leads for implementing the UNICEF Neonatal Standards on NICU, created a working group with previous service users to develop new written information booklets designed to support parents whose babies are admitted to NICU, to support their own lactation and feeding choices.

Alice and Tim’s daughter Emily was born at 24+6 weeks gestation in mid-December 2022 and weighed just 706g. She was cared for on NICU for three months. They agreed to share their own photos showing Emily’s feeding journey from admission through to discharge and beyond, allowing new parents a glimpse of what to expect on NICU.

Thanks to the support provided by the team Alice was able to express and provide Emily with colostrum, the early breast milk made in the first few days after giving birth. With the ongoing support given on the unit, Alice then went on to breastfeed successfully at home once baby Emily was discharged at 36 weeks.

Photos of the family have been used in a new 54-page booklet which will be adapted for use on neonatal units at the James Paget University Hospital and the Queen Elizabeth Hospital in King’s Lynn. A shorter booklet has also been produced for parents of babies who are expected to have a shorter NICU stay and for those who would like to bottle feed their baby.  NHS Start for Life has kindly funded printing of the booklets.

Suzy Goodfellow, who designed the booklets, said: “By working alongside the Neonatal Voices Partnership, we’ve been able to build on the First Drops project to improve lactation care of parents whose baby is admitted to NICU.  This is all part of our ambition to become Baby Friendly Accredited for the UNICEF Neonatal Standards, empowering parents to be partners in care. We would like to thank Alice and Tim for agreeing to help us with the materials. They will help many more families to provide crucial breast milk to their preterm and sick babies and establish breastfeeding in very difficult circumstances.”

Alice said: “I was happy to be involved because there’s so many things to navigate while on NICU, it’s very emotional and stressful. Expressing to support feeding was really important to us, as well as completing cares for Emily which were the only ways we could bond initially until we could do skin to skin. We want to help with anything that supports families on their journey, and that helps staff to support families.”

Tim said: “As a new father you’re never prepared for what’s come after birth, and even less so when you’re plunged into NICU at 24 weeks.  We were delighted to help with these booklets which give a greater consistency of support, with information all in one place, to families who also find themselves in our position.”