Infant Feeding Support Worker Main Duties and Responsibilities

The post-holder will support the Infant Feeding Lead/HENRY Coordinator to deliver services to families in Haringey. This would include contributing to the delivery of Breastfeeding Support; Starting Solids and the evidence-based HENRY Parenting Programme, which may be in client's home setting, telephone support, as well as group work at the Family Hubs, Children and Health Centres.
The Infant Feeding Support Worker will have knowledge of the UNICEF Baby Friendly Initiative and expected to support to achieve full accreditation commencing with Stage 2: An Educated Workforce, by ensuring that community standards are sustained and embedded across the Health Visiting service.
The Infant Feeding Support Worker is pivotal in facilitating health promotion groups for families. The post-holder will play an active role as a Resource and Champion for Infant Feeding, as well as healthier options for the young children and their families., 1. Offering specialist support and guidance for mothers to initiate and maintain breastfeeding - in various settings in groups or one-to-one
2. Support parents who mix or formula feed with the information they need to feed their babies safely and responsively.
3. Promote breastfeeding service effectively, taking advantage of local and national promotional events (as appropriate) e.g., National Breastfeeding Week or World Breastfeeding Week.

• Assist in implementation of a Haringey Breastfeeding welcome scheme, including visiting/contacting local public spaces/buildings, businesses to invite them to sign up to the scheme.

4. Support the Programme Lead with the implementation of UNICEF UK Baby Friendly Initiative

• Play an active role as a resource and champion.


• Assist with induction programmes for new members of staff.

5. To facilitate/co facilitate the HENRY parenting programme at various locations in Haringey and online.
6. To complete administration tasks relevant to the role and services provided for example reviewing referrals for the HENRY programme, offering parents a place sending out confirmation etc.
7. To participate in audit, quality improvement, research projects and/or innovations following agreed policy and protocol.
8. Maintain accurate and appropriate documentation.
9. Ensure all relevant Trust and National policies and guidelines are adhered to.
10. To attend regular safeguarding supervision groups

Working for our organisation
Whittington Health serves a richly diverse population and works hard to ensure that all our services are fair and equally accessible to everyone. Nowhere is this more obvious than in the way we look after our staff. We aim to employ a workforce which is as representative as possible of this population, so we are open to the value of differences in age, disability, gender, marital status, pregnancy and maternity, race, sexual orientation, and religion or belief. The Trust believes that as a public sector organisation we have an obligation to have recruitment, training, promotion and other formal employment policies and procedures that are sensitive to these differences. We think that by doing so, we are better able to treat our patients as well as being a better place to work., 1. Support the Infant Feeding Lead/HENRY Coordinator to deliver services to families in Haringey, undertaking agreed activities within the home setting, telephone; as well as in Children and Health Centres as required. This may include:
+ Offering specialist support and guidance for mothers to initiate and maintain breastfeeding - face-to-face in group settings, at home, or on the phone/video call.
+ Support mothers with more complex breastfeeding needs e.g. multiple births.
+ Recording notes on RIO.
+ Working in partnership with children and their families/carers
+ Maintaining equipment; as well as adequate supplies of health promotion material appropriate to the needs of the service.
+ Preparing and enabling a safe environment within the setting where services are being delivered.
+ Identifying and reporting on hazards that may be detrimental to the health and well -being of the child, patient, or carer to ensure appropriate action to be taken, for example, faulty equipment.
2. Promote breastfeeding service effectively - identifying opportunities and proactively suggesting ways to connect with the local community.
+ Assist in implementation of a Haringey Breastfeeding welcome scheme, including visiting/contacting local public spaces/buildings, businesses to invite them to sign up to the scheme.
+ Use organisational skills to help prepare for, as well as participate and support with local and national promotional events (as appropriate) e.g., National Breastfeeding Week or World Breastfeeding Week.
3. Offer specialist support and guidance for mothers to initiate and maintain breastfeeding - in group settings, at home, face-to-face or on the phone.
4. Support parents who mix or formula feed with the information they need to feed their babies safely and responsively.
5. Use skills to support and/or facilitate breastfeeding support groups and antenatal breastfeeding/postnatal workshops in a variety of settings.
6. Use judgement to identify, assess, and refer babies for tongue tie division, following discussion and full verbal consent of mother/parents.
7. Provide verbal and written information to clients on service and health issues to enable clients to access resources efficiently.
8. Support to achieve full accreditation of the UNICEF Baby Friendly Initiative commencing with Stage 2: An Educated Workforce, by ensuring that community standards are sustained and embedded across the Health Visiting service.
9. Facilitate/co facilitate the HENRY parenting programme at various locations in Haringey and online.
10. Complete administration tasks relevant to the role and services provided for example reviewing referrals for the HENRY programme, offering parents a place sending out confirmation etc.
11. Undertake administrative task as delegated by the Infant Feeding Lead/HENRY Coordinator including Minute Taking for meetings.
12. To participate in audit, quality improvement, research projects and/or innovations following agreed policy and protocol such as breastfeeding' audits with staff and mothers.
13. Provide accurate statistical data by inputting and managing IT data, for example, email, ethnic monitoring.
14. Play an active role in the locality teams acting as a resource and champion.
15. Assist in the planning and implementation of induction programmes for new members of staff.
16. Supervise new staff/students.
17. Maintain accurate and appropriate documentation.
18. Work within boundary and scope, knowing when to refer on
19. Work collaboratively with the Health Visiting Team and wider multi-agency teams to include children's centres and outside agencies also providing an element of infant feeding support services.
20. Safeguard people by recognising and responding when an adult or child might be at risk from abuse but also recognising own limits and asking for help and escalate concerns when necessary.
21. To attend regular safeguarding supervision groups
22. Ensure Health and Safety policies and all relevant Trust and National policies and guidelines are adhered to, including issues relating to the Children Act, Children's rights and needs.
23. Be kind and responsive embracing Whittington Health ICARE Values.
Communication
1. Create awareness of role with members of Haringey.
2. Attend and participate in team meetings, and educational forums.
3. Maintain accurate and appropriate documentation.
4. Complete records for the statistical/planning purposes at appropriate times.
Personnel
1. Be aware of the regulations regarding the Data Protection Act and Equal Opportunity Policy according to Whittington Health regulations
2. Be responsible for keeping up to date with new developments.
3. Take responsible care of the health and safety of yourself and other personnel who may be affected by your acts of omission at work and cooperate with the Trust in achieving the statutory and departmental guidelines on health and safety.
4. Attend relevant training courses as appropriate to the post.
The post holder is an employee of Whittington Health and as such may be asked to change base or department in light of service needs.
This job description is a reflection of the current position, and the post holder is expected to view it as a guide rather than an exact description of all duties and responsibilities. It may be varied from time to time in consultation with the post holder.
Health and Safety
In carrying out these duties the employee is required to take reasonable care to avoid injury or accident, which may be caused by work activities. The duties must be performed in accordance with the departmental Code of Practice, which is designed to secure safety in the work practices and in the handling of materials, substances and equipment., To obtain, process and/or use information held on a computer or word processor in a fair way if required to do so, to hold for a specific registered purpose and not to disclose or in any way incompatible with such purposes. To disclose data to authorised person or organisation as instructed
This job description is a framework for the post holder. It is subject to review and amendment according to the needs of the service.
SAFEGUARDING CHILDREN AND ADULTS
To comply with the Trust's Safeguarding Children and Adults policies, procedures and protocols. All individual members of staff (paid or unpaid) have a duty to safeguard and promote the welfare of children, young people and vulnerable adults This will require you to:
+ Ensure you are familiar with and comply with the London Child Protection Procedures and protocols for promoting and safeguarding the welfare of children and young people.
+ Ensure you are familiar and comply with the London Multi Agency Safeguarding Vulnerable Adults Pan London Procedures.
+ Ensure you are familiar and comply with local protocols and systems for information sharing.
+ Know the appropriate contact numbers and required reporting lines.
+ Participate in required training and supervision.
+ Comply with required professional boundaries and codes of conduct
Whittington Health is committed to safeguarding all children and vulnerable adults and expects all staff and volunteers to share this commitment.
Your application form -
1. Provide only business email address for your referees - we are unable to request references from yahoo, Hotmail, Gmail accounts.
2. Make sure you to include all evidence of where you meet the essential requirement on the jobs description as this forms the base of our shortlisting criteria.
Our processes -
1. Closing dates are given as a guide; we are within our right to close adverts early so please ensure you submit your application as soon as possible to avoid delay.
2. If you do not hear from us up to 3 weeks after the closing date of the job unfortunately this means you have not been successfully shortlisted for interview. If your require feedback on your application please contact the appointing manager detailed in the body of the advert.
3. Please check your emails regularly as all correspondence from us will be via trac.systems - occasionally these emails will go into your Junk folder.
4. Employment at Whittington Health is offered subject to successful completion of a 6 month probationary period for all staff with the exception of GMC Registered Doctors.
Other important information -
+ Applications from job seekers who require sponsorship to work in the UK are welcome and will be considered alongside all other applications. Before submitting your application and to avoid disappointment please check that you are eligible under the UKVI points based system.
+ Applications are welcome from people wishing to job share or work flexible patterns. We are committed to equal opportunities.
+ In submitting an application form, you authorise Whittington Health NHS Trust to confirm any previous NHS service details via the Inter Authority Transfer (IAT) process should you be appointed to the post.
If you are offered a role with one of the NLPSS partner trusts, as part of pre-employment checks your identity and right to work documentation will be verified remotely (in most circumstances), using a certified identity verification service provider TrustID. You will be asked to capture an image of the relevant documents as well as a "selfie" using your smartphone/tablet (if available) for facial matching. TrustID will also perform a digital address check using Trunarrative and Equifax, which is a soft check and does not leave a footprint on your credit rating. For more information, visit www.trustid.co.uk
Please note that during the recruitment process your Identity Documentation (i.e. passport, driving licence, visa, etc.) will be scanned using a device which recognises UV, Infrared and Machine Readable Zone security features of the documents provided
The Trust uses electronic new starter forms on Trac to collect personal details. Information collected is securely stored and used to set up the employee record on the ESR HR system.
We would welcome applications from individuals who are from underrepresented groups in the organisation