Feeding

NHS Fife Maternity Services has been accredited as a Unicef UK Baby Friendly Initiative ‘Gold’ service in recognition of the quality care that our families receive. The award recognises how the service promotes, supports and protects breast feeding as well as parent-baby relationship building.

Neonatal services in Fife are also Unicef UK Baby Friendly Initiative accredited in recognition of supporting close and loving relationships, maximising the use of breast milk and including parents as partners in care.

Supporting breastfeeding in Fife Week

The Scottish breastfeeding week aims to focus on enabling new mothers/parents to consider their breastfeeding journey and how they can be supported to make choices about breastfeeding. We hope to support women to decide if breastfeeding is the right choice, breastfeed in public, return to work whilst breastfeeding.

As part of Breastfeeding Week Fife, you'll find many resources and access to local and national peer support on our Breastfeeding Week Fife pages.

How you choose to feed your baby is one of the first decisions you will need to make as a new parent. This is a very personal decision and does not need to be made until baby is born. However, breastfeeding your baby does has protective factors and long term health benefits for both you and your baby.

During your pregnancy you should have had the opportunity to discuss your thoughts and feelings about feeding with your midwife. You should also have received an ‘Off to a good Start’ book which is full of relevant information whichever method of feeding you choose. To help with your choices please visit the parentclub.scot website.

A newborn baby’s tummy is tiny and therefore cannot take large volumes of milk. This means that often, in the beginning, babies will feed frequently e.g. 8 -12 times in a 24 hour period. We recommend that babies are fed responsively. This means feeding baby when he shows feeding cues rather than trying to establish a feeding routine. If breast feeding, this also means offering the breast to comfort baby or for your own comfort too.

NHS Fife is here to support you whichever way you choose to feed our baby.

Please note that the leaflets and websites detailed below are also available from your Maternity Notes app.

Supporting breastfeeding in Fife Week

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