Babies and Very Young Children
A focused task and finish group has recently been reviewing our approach to babies and very young children across the partnership, for example...
ICON is being rolled out to professionals through Devon and Cornwall. ICON is all about helping people who care for babies to cope with crying, for more information please see the ICON website here Home - ICON Cope
And the child's voice and domestic abuse multi-agency forum is currently working on developing various ways of ensuring that the voice of babies and very young children is heard in situations where domestic abuse is present. The For Baby’s Sake Trust have shared findings highlighting that babies and children are also victims of domestic abuse, which can have lifelong impacts on physical, emotional and mental health. See our webpage here for more information about domestic abuse.
Related Guidance & Further Reading
Safer Sleep
Safer sleep advice saves babies lives. Reduce the risk of SIDS by giving evidence-based safer sleep advice in your practice.
The Lullaby Trust provide useful safer sleeping advice to help parents and carers reduce the risk of sudden infant death syndrome.
We want safer sleeping to be everyone’s business in Cornwall and we’re asking all partners working with families to promote and reinforce safer sleep messages.
- This free training is designed to support you to do this, by increasing your awareness of Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) and the evidence-based safer sleep advice to reduce the risk of SIDS.
Smoking in Pregnancy and Early Years
Smoking is the leading modifiable risk factor for poor pregnancy outcomes. These include stillbirth, miscarriage, preterm birth, low birth weight, birth defects, and SIDs. Smoking also increases the risk of developing chest and ear infections, and respiratory conditions. Creating and maintaining smoke free environments, particularly during pregnancy and in homes with infants and young children, is a critical step in safeguarding infant health.
Pregnant smokers are supported to use nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) and/or nicotine vapes as an alternative to smoking during pregnancy. This article shares the findings from a randomised controlled trial ‘Electronic cigarettes versus nicotine patches for smoking cessation in pregnancy’.
Advice from ASH suggests that regular use of vapes or NRT during pregnancy does not appear to be associated with any adverse effects in mothers or their babies. If a pregnant woman chooses to vape and it helps her to quit smoking and stay smokefree, she should be supported to do so.
Resources from ASH around vaping before, during and after pregnancy such as leaflets and infographics may be useful for professionals and can be accessed and download here.
If nicotine vapes help someone stay smokefree they should continue to be used once baby is born. However, whilst current evidence suggests that vaping is substantially less harmful than smoking, there is insufficient evidence on the safety of vaping around babies and young children. While no direct harms have been established, as a reasonable precaution, vaping in the vicinity of infants and children at home or in a car is not advised. NRT can be used as a safe and effective alternative.
See also the NHS Better Health page ‘vaping myths and the facts’ here.
Working with father & male carers
The Myth of Invisible Men - Safeguarding children under 1 from non-accidental injury caused by male carers September 2021 - This is the third national review commissioned by the Child Safeguarding Practice Review Panel. It focusses on the circumstances of babies under 1 year old who have been harmed or killed by their fathers or other males in a caring role. We also have the Seven Minute briefing that we produced on this topic.
Infant Feeding
Infancy is a crucial time for good diet. We know that the cost of formula milk has created difficulties for many families. Colleagues in Public Health and the Council have developed this Seven Minute briefing to support conversations about infant feeding in the first 12 months.
Families who have experienced the sudden and unexpected death of a baby or young child are often very anxious when they have another baby. The Lullaby Trust’s Care of Next Infant (CONI) support is available locally and provides emotional and practical support to bereaved families during pregnancy and throughout the early months of their new baby’s life, allowing them to enjoy this special time. Please contact the Health Visiting Team for more information.
The National Child Mortality Database (NCMD) is an NHS funded project, delivered by the University of Bristol, that gathers information on all children who die across England. Their aim is to learn lessons that could lead to changes to improve and save children’s lives in the future. They provide a summary of safety notices for professionals working with families to share including:
- Babies – keep it simple
- Nappy sacks
- Blind cords