St. Joseph's Health is the only "baby friendly" hospital in Central New York. Accreditation from Baby Friendly USA indicates the hospital supports breastfeeding and the steps described by World Health Organization.
Dr. Jonathan Chai, Director of Newborn Services, shares how breastfeeding benefits babies, and the support and guidance available at St. Joseph's Health.
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What Does It Mean to Be Baby-Friendly?
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Learn more about Jonathan T. Chai, MD
Jonathan T. Chai, MD
Jonathan T. Chai, MD graduated from the Yale University School of Medicine in 1991. He works in Syracuse, NY and specializes in Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine and Pediatrics. Chai is affiliated with St Joseph's Hospital Health Center.Learn more about Jonathan T. Chai, MD
Transcription:
Bill Klaproth (Host): St. Joseph’s Health is the only baby friendly hospital in central New York. So what does it mean to be baby friendly? Here to tell us is Dr. Jonathan Chai, Director of Newborn Services at St. Joseph’s Health. Dr. Chai, thank you so much for your time. So what is a baby friendly hospital and a baby friendly accreditation?
Dr. Jonathan Chai (Guest): A baby friendly hospital is one that has made a commitment to supporting breast feeding. They’re following the ten steps to successful breast feeding that were initially established by the World Health Organization and accreditation comes from an organization called Baby Friendly USA.
Bill: So speaking of breast feeding, baby friendly hospitals and birthing centers are more likely to initiate exclusive breast feeding and more likely to sustain breast feeding at six months and at one year of age. So why is that important and what are the advantages of breast feeding?
Dr. Chai: There are many well documented benefits to both baby and mom. For the baby, there are fewer childhood infections, reduced allergy and its becoming more recognized that even some chronic illnesses such as obesity, hypertension, diabetes, and autoimmune disease are all reduced in babies that breast feed for at least six months to a year.
Bill: So I know the requirement talks about the ten steps to successful breast feeding. I’m not going to ask you to give me all ten now, but can you give us an overview of those ten steps?
Dr. Chai: Yeah they encompass things such as education for the staff and for the parents. Certain practices such as getting the baby to have it’s first breast feeding within the first hour of life, having the baby room in with the mother instead of it being in the nursery and limiting the use of supplemental formula, trying to get the baby to only breastfeed unless there’s a medical need for something else.
Bill: So let’s talk about that first hour. So first off, skin to skin bonding at birth. Tell us about that.
Dr. Chai: Yeah we want – it’s been shown that babies that go skin to skin and attempt their first breastfeeding within the first hour of life, it significantly improves exclusive breastfeeding rates, mother’s milk supply, and the ability to maintain breastfeeding for an extended period of time.
Bill: So in that first hour then you also delay bathing and weighing to allow the baby to bond with he mother right then and there for that first hour. So kind of everything is put on hold and baby goes right to mom, is that it?
Dr. Chai: Exactly, that’s correct.
Bill: And then the baby stays in the room with mom overnight too, mom and dad, overnight too, right?
Dr. Chai: That’s right. We want to try to have the babies with the parents as much as possible and one of the benefits of that is it allows the family to respond to early feeding cues the baby might show. It’s called feeding on demand. So as soon as the baby starts to indicate that they’re ready to eat, that’s the best time to have the baby eat rather than have them on a schedule or whatnot.
Bill: This is such a change from the old ways of doing things. Well I know some hospitals still do it that way, but baby is born and the whisked away to the nursey. This is quite a change.
Dr. Chai: It’s a big change from what we used to do and it took a little bit of time for both the staff and the parents to adopt to it, but now it’s been very much embraced.
Bill: And when it comes to the parents, before birth, you obviously, not you personally but members of the baby friendly team, go over with the parents, hey this is how it’s going to work, the baby stays with mom, we don’t whisk the baby away, etc.; that whole process is explained then to the parents so they know what to expect?
Dr. Chai: Yeah, they’ll get that education through their obstetrician or midwife and then we pick it up when the baby is born.
Bill: So let’s talk about the certification and the requirements. What are the requirements as far as training goes in becoming a baby friendly hospital?
Dr. Chai: As far as training, all our nurses and providers have a minimum number of hours of breast feeding education that they have to complete, and then there’s also an education piece for the mom and family.
Bill: So can you talk about this? This is pretty impressive and what it means to you. St. Joseph’s Health is only one out of 533 hospitals of over 6,000 with baby friendly status. That is pretty impressive.
Dr. Chai: It really is and I’m very proud to be part of this hospital system that’s supporting breast feeding to this extent. I do very strongly feel that breastfeeding is best for babies and glad that our hospital supports that.
Bill: And the neonatal services at St. Joseph’s Health Hospital has also been named the Press Ganey Guardian of Excellence Award winner so can you talk about your family centered approach overall?
Dr. Chai: Yeah in the neonatal intensive care unit, we recognize that unfortunately for babies that come out and have some problems and are sick, that they do have to be separated from the parents and that kind of throws a little bit of a wrench in otherwise what our ideal process would be where the baby stays with the family, so we really try to as much as possible, as much as the baby’s condition permits, we have the moms and families able to visit as much as they can, and as soon as the babies condition permits, we do even in the NICU let them breast feed and we continue to work very closely with them and the lactation consultants to make sure that – we have to do things a little different for NICU babies but we still very much support breast feeding.
Bill: That’s really good to know and a good distinction. And I also want to ask, some parents may not want this baby friendly approach for whatever reason, and that’s okay too, right?
Dr. Chai: Yeah, absolutely. We’re not totally rigid on this and we recognize that it’s not necessarily going to be for everybody and whatever the parent’s feeding choices we’ll support that.
Bill: Well that makes sense but really a lot of good information here and so happy to hear about the baby friendly approach at St. Joseph’s Health Hospital. Dr. Chai thank you so much for your time today. And for more information, there’s a fantastic webpage, just visit sjhsyr.org/maternity, that’s sjhsyr.org/maternity. You’re going to find a lot of useful information on that page. This is St. Joseph’s Health Medcast from St. Joseph’s Health. I’m Bill Klaproth, thanks for listening.
Bill Klaproth (Host): St. Joseph’s Health is the only baby friendly hospital in central New York. So what does it mean to be baby friendly? Here to tell us is Dr. Jonathan Chai, Director of Newborn Services at St. Joseph’s Health. Dr. Chai, thank you so much for your time. So what is a baby friendly hospital and a baby friendly accreditation?
Dr. Jonathan Chai (Guest): A baby friendly hospital is one that has made a commitment to supporting breast feeding. They’re following the ten steps to successful breast feeding that were initially established by the World Health Organization and accreditation comes from an organization called Baby Friendly USA.
Bill: So speaking of breast feeding, baby friendly hospitals and birthing centers are more likely to initiate exclusive breast feeding and more likely to sustain breast feeding at six months and at one year of age. So why is that important and what are the advantages of breast feeding?
Dr. Chai: There are many well documented benefits to both baby and mom. For the baby, there are fewer childhood infections, reduced allergy and its becoming more recognized that even some chronic illnesses such as obesity, hypertension, diabetes, and autoimmune disease are all reduced in babies that breast feed for at least six months to a year.
Bill: So I know the requirement talks about the ten steps to successful breast feeding. I’m not going to ask you to give me all ten now, but can you give us an overview of those ten steps?
Dr. Chai: Yeah they encompass things such as education for the staff and for the parents. Certain practices such as getting the baby to have it’s first breast feeding within the first hour of life, having the baby room in with the mother instead of it being in the nursery and limiting the use of supplemental formula, trying to get the baby to only breastfeed unless there’s a medical need for something else.
Bill: So let’s talk about that first hour. So first off, skin to skin bonding at birth. Tell us about that.
Dr. Chai: Yeah we want – it’s been shown that babies that go skin to skin and attempt their first breastfeeding within the first hour of life, it significantly improves exclusive breastfeeding rates, mother’s milk supply, and the ability to maintain breastfeeding for an extended period of time.
Bill: So in that first hour then you also delay bathing and weighing to allow the baby to bond with he mother right then and there for that first hour. So kind of everything is put on hold and baby goes right to mom, is that it?
Dr. Chai: Exactly, that’s correct.
Bill: And then the baby stays in the room with mom overnight too, mom and dad, overnight too, right?
Dr. Chai: That’s right. We want to try to have the babies with the parents as much as possible and one of the benefits of that is it allows the family to respond to early feeding cues the baby might show. It’s called feeding on demand. So as soon as the baby starts to indicate that they’re ready to eat, that’s the best time to have the baby eat rather than have them on a schedule or whatnot.
Bill: This is such a change from the old ways of doing things. Well I know some hospitals still do it that way, but baby is born and the whisked away to the nursey. This is quite a change.
Dr. Chai: It’s a big change from what we used to do and it took a little bit of time for both the staff and the parents to adopt to it, but now it’s been very much embraced.
Bill: And when it comes to the parents, before birth, you obviously, not you personally but members of the baby friendly team, go over with the parents, hey this is how it’s going to work, the baby stays with mom, we don’t whisk the baby away, etc.; that whole process is explained then to the parents so they know what to expect?
Dr. Chai: Yeah, they’ll get that education through their obstetrician or midwife and then we pick it up when the baby is born.
Bill: So let’s talk about the certification and the requirements. What are the requirements as far as training goes in becoming a baby friendly hospital?
Dr. Chai: As far as training, all our nurses and providers have a minimum number of hours of breast feeding education that they have to complete, and then there’s also an education piece for the mom and family.
Bill: So can you talk about this? This is pretty impressive and what it means to you. St. Joseph’s Health is only one out of 533 hospitals of over 6,000 with baby friendly status. That is pretty impressive.
Dr. Chai: It really is and I’m very proud to be part of this hospital system that’s supporting breast feeding to this extent. I do very strongly feel that breastfeeding is best for babies and glad that our hospital supports that.
Bill: And the neonatal services at St. Joseph’s Health Hospital has also been named the Press Ganey Guardian of Excellence Award winner so can you talk about your family centered approach overall?
Dr. Chai: Yeah in the neonatal intensive care unit, we recognize that unfortunately for babies that come out and have some problems and are sick, that they do have to be separated from the parents and that kind of throws a little bit of a wrench in otherwise what our ideal process would be where the baby stays with the family, so we really try to as much as possible, as much as the baby’s condition permits, we have the moms and families able to visit as much as they can, and as soon as the babies condition permits, we do even in the NICU let them breast feed and we continue to work very closely with them and the lactation consultants to make sure that – we have to do things a little different for NICU babies but we still very much support breast feeding.
Bill: That’s really good to know and a good distinction. And I also want to ask, some parents may not want this baby friendly approach for whatever reason, and that’s okay too, right?
Dr. Chai: Yeah, absolutely. We’re not totally rigid on this and we recognize that it’s not necessarily going to be for everybody and whatever the parent’s feeding choices we’ll support that.
Bill: Well that makes sense but really a lot of good information here and so happy to hear about the baby friendly approach at St. Joseph’s Health Hospital. Dr. Chai thank you so much for your time today. And for more information, there’s a fantastic webpage, just visit sjhsyr.org/maternity, that’s sjhsyr.org/maternity. You’re going to find a lot of useful information on that page. This is St. Joseph’s Health Medcast from St. Joseph’s Health. I’m Bill Klaproth, thanks for listening.