Band 6 Infant Feeding Midwife

The role of the Infant Feeding Midwife is to promote the uptake and duration of breastfeeding in accordance with Unicef Baby Friendly (BFI) Initiative Standards by ensuring the multidisciplinary team is appropriately educated, and mothers/parents are well informed and have access to skilled feeding support when required., The role involves working autonomously to maintain the Standards of the Unicef Baby Friendly Stage 1 and preparing for achieving stage 2. This will require on-going staff training and regular auditing of staff practice, and the care mothers/parents receive. The post holder will have in depth knowledge and understanding of the Unicef Baby Friendly Standards for Maternity Services and the Audit process.

The Infant Feeding Midwife will be an experienced, competent practitioner who will take responsibility for ensuring the multi-professional team provide high quality evidenced based infant feeding support to pregnant women/individuals, mothers/parents and their babies. The post holder will provide visible support to staff and parents in the clinical areas to ensure the successful initiation and continuation of relationship building and breastfeeding.

Under the direction of the Infant Feeding Specialist Midwife, the post holder will regularly assess, plan and implement specialist interventions for families experiencing urgent, complex or challenging infant feeding issues.

Together with the Infant Feeding Specialist Midwife the post holder will take responsibility for the training and education of all health professionals within the Maternity Services and will share specialist knowledge with other groups and agencies.

Walsall Healthcare NHS Trust is an integrated Trust and the only provider of NHS acute care in Walsall, serving a population of 284,300. It provides inpatient and outpatient services at the Manor Hospital as well as a wide range of services in the community. Walsall Manor houses the full range of district general hospital services under one roof. The £170 million development was completed in 2010, and ongoing upgrades ensure the Trust now has state-of-the-art facilities, including a Critical Care Unit, Neonatal Unit, Obstetric Theatre, and Integrated Assessment Unit. A new Urgent and Emergency Care Centre, opened in March 2023, has significantly improved emergency care facilities and capacity, providing almost 5,000 square metres of additional clinical space.