Health visitors 'Baby Friendly Award' for third year

Val Rimmer (far right) with the Heywood, Middleton & Rochdale community breastfeeding champions and RMBC children’s centre staff.

Health visitors from Pennine Care NHS Foundation Trust have maintained Baby Friendly status for the third year running.

Established by UNICEF and the World Health Organisation, Baby Friendly aims to support parents’ preferred method of feeding their child, with a particular focus on breastfeeding. It involves services meeting a set of standards to help support new families.

These include ensuring facilities across the area are breastfeeding-friendly and providing training for health visitors and peer support volunteers, to enable them to offer breastfeeding support to parents.

Providing ongoing support to staff and having regular contact with service users has also helped to contribute towards their high standards. Work is already underway to achieve advanced status - the next level of Baby Friendly.

Val Rimmer, Pennine Care’s Infant Feeding Co-ordinator for the Borough, said: “Receiving this award for the third year shows our constant desire to deliver the best possible service for all our mums.”