E-Thesis 283 views 83 downloads
What are the needs and challenges of breastfed medically complex infants and children in the paediatric setting? / LYNDSEY HOOKWAY
Swansea University Author: LYNDSEY HOOKWAY
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PDF | E-Thesis – open access
Copyright: The Author, Lyndsey Hookway, 2023. Distributed under the terms of a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).
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DOI (Published version): 10.23889/SUthesis.65059
Abstract
Breastfeeding is known to provide optimal nutrition and immunological support to young children. There are many systems in place to facilitate and protect breastfeeding, such as policies, training programs and specialist practitioners employed within certain settings. However, the support and traini...
| Published: |
Swansea, Wales, UK
2023
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| Institution: | Swansea University |
| Degree level: | Doctoral |
| Degree name: | Ph.D |
| Supervisor: | Brown, A. and Lewis, J. |
| URI: | https://cronfa.swan.ac.uk/Record/cronfa65059 |
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| Abstract: |
Breastfeeding is known to provide optimal nutrition and immunological support to young children. There are many systems in place to facilitate and protect breastfeeding, such as policies, training programs and specialist practitioners employed within certain settings. However, the support and training are weighted towards the initiation of breastfeeding in healthy newborns, as well as supporting the preterm population. Paediatric settings do not have the same investment in training, policy, or staffing. Within paediatrics, different breastfeeding challenges exist, meaning that not only do staff often not have a baseline level of breastfeeding knowledge, but they also require more nuanced training to effectively support families to overcome difficulties. There is a paucity of research on this subpopulation, especially within the UK, therefore a systematic review was conducted and used to focus the research studies on the identified gaps. Two studies were conducted to identify the knowledge and skills of professionals, and the experiences of mothers breastfeeding their medically complex child in the paediatric setting. The first study was a national survey of 409 multidisciplinary healthcare and allied health professionals working in paediatrics. The second study recruited 30 mothers of children who had been inpatients on paediatric wards or paediatric intensive care units and explored their challenges, barriers and views using semi-structured interviews. The research found that many paediatric professionals have significant gaps in their knowledge and skills, reported several obstacles in terms of unsupportive ward cultures, and identified that current breastfeeding training does not meet the needs of these professionals working to support sick breastfed children in hospital. Furthermore, while some mothers are strongly motivated to breastfeed their sick child, they encounter a range of institutional, clinical and environmental barriers to breastfeeding. The findings suggest that nuanced paediatric-focused breastfeeding training along with a focus on providing family-centred, compassionate care and supportive environments is clinically justified to support families to reach their personal feeding goals and optimise health outcomes for children. |
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| Item Description: |
A selection of content is redacted or is partially redacted from this thesis to protect sensitive and personal information. |
| Keywords: |
Breastfeeding, paediatrics, medical complexity |
| College: |
Faculty of Medicine, Health and Life Sciences |