Promoting Infant Mental Health Through Evidence-Informed Interventions to Support Infant Feeding and the Transition to Parenthood: A Clinical Practice Example.
Judy L Buchan, Claudine T Bennett
PMID 32098502WHAT IT FOUND
Peel parents described new parenthood as stressful, isolated and confusing about infant feeding.
Public health nurses used local data to build hospital, clinic, home, peer and online infant feeding supports, but no outcomes were tested.
Key findings
01Peel parents described becoming a parent as a major transition, with isolation, anxiety, exhaustion and confusion about infant feeding.
02Peel infant feeding data showed 98% of women who intended to breastfeed initiated breastfeeding, but only 13% of babies were exclusively breastfed at six months.
03The public health nursing supports included hospital liaison, peer phone support, clinic and home visits, and telephone, email and Facebook advice.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for RNs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
The paper describes planning and delivery of a program, but it does not test whether the interventions changed breastfeeding, parental well-being or infant mental health. Formal evaluations were reported for only some interventions, and the intensive home visiting model was still being evaluated. The authors state the interventions do not adequately meet the needs of fathers or families of diverse sexualities and gender identities. The work is specific to Peel, Ontario, where hospital birth, short postpartum stays and public health nursing roles shape the model. The paper does not give a single participant number for the program or any evaluation.
Declared interests
The authors declared no potential conflicts of interest and received no financial support.
The easy way to misread this
Do not read this as evidence that public health nursing infant feeding supports improve breastfeeding duration or mental health. No patient outcomes were tested.