Last Updated on September 27, 2017 by cassnetwork
Baby-Friendly USA, has announced that Logansport Memorial Hospital has received prestigious international recognition as a Baby-Friendly Designated birth facility. This achievement recognizes hospitals for offering mothers and their babies an optimal level of care, providing the information, confidence, skills, and support needed to successfully initiate and continue breastfeeding their babies.
“We could not be more pleased to have received this exciting news,” shares Perry Gay, President and CEO for Logansport Memorial Hospital. “Our staff in the Women’s Health Center and the Family Birth Center have worked together to ensure that the expectant mothers who choose us for the birth of their children are receiving the best evidence-based care that can be provided. It was a huge undertaking to meet the requirements for this prestigious designation, but it has enabled us to provide better care for the families in our community.”
“We met the rigorous requirements of Baby-Friendly designation by implementing new standards of care, including the practice of ‘rooming in,’ which allows mothers and infants to remain together 24-hours a day while under our care in the Family Birth Center,” comments Cynthia Vogel, Director of Obstetrics for Logansport Memorial Hospital. “ ‘Rooming in’ allows for maternal/infant bonding, as well as enhances the mother’s knowledge in recognizing her baby’s needs and feeding cues. We also committed to providing additional and ongoing breastfeeding education to all staff, from nurses to physicians and providers, to ensure best-practices are continually shared and used with our patients. The ‘skin-to-skin’ initiative has also been a welcomed change for our moms and families, where even patients who have Cesarean sections can have immediate physical contact with their babies following delivery.”
Cynthia went on to share more about the reasons for pursuing Baby-Friendly designation. “We are an outcomes-driven organization, making care decisions based on what’s safest and best for our patients. The evidence is overwhelming that breastmilk is absolutely the best nutrition a baby can have, and that breastfeeding has numerous benefits for the mother as well. The outstanding work by our dedicated physicians and nurses combined with the strong support of our hospital leadership in always putting patients first led to this achievement. The practice of breastfeeding has always been an important part of what we do in the Family Birth Center, and this designation is significant to the community.”
Baby-Friendly USA, Inc is the U.S. authority for the implementation of the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative (“BFHI”), a global program sponsored by the World Health Organization (WHO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF). The initiative encourages and recognizes hospitals and birthing centers that offer an optimal level of care for breastfeeding mothers and their babies. Based on the “Ten Steps to Successful Breastfeeding,” this prestigious international award recognizes birth facilities that offer breastfeeding mothers the information, confidence, and skills needed to successfully initiate and continue breastfeeding their babies.
There are more than 20,000 designated Baby-Friendly hospitals and birth centers worldwide. Currently there are 457 active Baby-Friendly hospitals and birth centers in the United States. Logansport Memorial Hospital is among just 15 hospitals in Indiana to be certified as a Baby-Friendly organization. For more information on the Baby-Friendly initiative, please visit www.babyfriendlyusa.org.
SOURCE: News release from Logansport Memorial Hospital