'Support for peer supporters' thread

[crikeybadger]

Join in here if you are a peer supporter or thinking of becoming one.

It's a space to share your good ideas for setting up and running groups, share concerns or offer suggestions for ways to support women with breastfeeding.

I know there's lots of peer supporters on this board so I think we can all learn a lot from each other.

TikTok - Can I ask what you mean by 'Buddying Up'? Is that where a peer supporter gets assigned to a mother? If it is we just don't have the peer supporters for that, I think we have about 10 active at the moment (and by active I mean not completely ignoring email pleas for help or they occasionally turn up at one drop in or another)

Our peer supporters ask mums antenatally whether they'd like to be contacted after they've had their baby. If they say yes, we ring them around their due date (sometimes the MW might tell us if they've delivered early, mostly not. They really aren't very helpful ) to check how they are doing and if they need any support.

Perhaps his is what tiktok means?

Just marking my place, will be back shortly :)

My top tips to establish a well-used breastfeeding support group:

1. Have a clear primary aim for the group. Make sure that you explain very clearly to the HCP's involved what this is and who they should be encouraging to use the group (Many HCP's I have come across, even if they are supportive, don't really have any idea what the groups are for)

2. Try to meet mums ante-natally (either at NHS classes or organise some sort of ante-natal meet and greet at your venue), ask them if they would like to sign up for peer support once their baby is born, telephone them around their due date and take it from there. (Never leave a message for them to ring you back, just try again a different time).

3. Use the local press to run features about any new services you are offering or any special events taking place.

4. Advertise the group yourselves, don't rely on anyone else to do it for you (YOU know the group better than anyone, and YOU are able to convey the information with more enthusiasm than anyone else)

5. Make meetings with the management (HV area manager, Head of Midwifery, Childrens Centre Manager) to talk directly about how they can help you.

6. Don't give up. Accept that it may take quite a while for the group to get established, you may have many weeks and weeks where no one will come. If you keep plugging at it it will happen eventually. :)

Some really great ideas here, so thanks everyone.

I'm fired up with enthusiasm again.

Buddying up = giving a specific peer supporter a specific mother to contact and invite to the group. It would be a phone call or two, no more - maybe an offer to call for her to go to the group if convenient; if not, to meet her there.

You'd need the nos. of the mothers, of course.

Thanks TikTok. I really like the idea and it has been raised before (under a different guise) when we were independent but shot down as unworkable due to low numbers of PS and being intrusive ()

I'll raise it again with the group to see how we think that will work under the NHS. If we could get phone numbers from new mothers who were intending on bfing then the calling and inviting them to a drop-in, that would work well.

I can't imagine though we will be able to bring mothers to the CFC though as I'm pretty sure we wouldn't be insured/allowed to take mothers/babies in our cars and most PS's cars are full of their own children any way .

And I couldn't do it as I don't drive and I and my DCs have to walk from Neighbourhood A where we live to Neighbourhood B to catch a bus to Neighbourhood C and then walk to Neighbourhood D where the CFC is, which takes about an hour. (If that made any sense?!)

Totally see the difficulty - I was imagining this all being done on foot, really. But a call, and 'I'll see you there' promise is helpful to a mother who's even a little bit shy.

Getting the numbers can be done if midwives and HVs take the thing seriously - and my experience is that many don't. But every time a midwife or HV sees a mother who is bf, she should mention the group, ask the mother if her number can be passed on, and then she should call the peer supporter co-ordinator with the no. This is not hard work for the peer supporter or the midwife.

Good luck!

Glad that others have posted, because I was also planning to ask for some opinions on our problems with low attendance. Unfortunately it's been a good week if 1 new mum has attended, many weeks it's only about 4 ps's and bfc sat around drinking squash :(

I live in a large market town. There is breastfeeding support somewhere in the town every weekday, including Babycafe which runs 2 days a week in the town centre.

I'm thinking of driving myself around all of the various groups in the next couple of weeks to try and promote a more joined up approach and a cross network between the different support groups. Plus to find out if the other groups are having more luck.

Unfortunately I can only really keep giving up the time whilst I'm on mat leave, which is also the case for several of the other peer supporters in our group. At this rate we're going to run out of pc's before we manage to help anybody...

It is worth reading the nice guidelines there are many sections in this to point out to the HCP's what is best practice.

I believe there is guidance regarding how peer supporters should be contacting new mums, it says something about 'breastfeeding mothers should be contacted by a peer supporter within 48hrs of delivery or discharge from hospital, be via telephone contact, home visit or groups'

It also predicts that something like 70-80% of mothers intending to breastfeed would sign up for peer support prior to giving birth, if they are given the chance to do this.

And also worth reading the baby friendly guidance :)

TikTok - I actually like the idea of calling new mums and inviting them to have a chat and get out the house with other mums who know what it's like to have a baby. It's what I envisaged doing when I became a PS - chatting, supporting, sympathising and encouraging mums to bf for as long as they want.

I think our real problem is that the HCPs see our group as a problem solving group (which is beyond the remit of a ps group) and not one of support and socialisation for bfing mums so we often get mums with huge problems way beyond our range referred by HCPs to us.

We then have to turn them around and refer on to where they should have gone in the first place (IFC at the hospital, TT Clinic, etc). Obviously we don't chuck them out of the room when we find out we can't help but we can't solve their problem like they were promised so parents might feel a bit 'pillar and post' and let down by us.

I just wish we could sort it out easily but it just is too political at times.

PS I just looked up my town and it has an area of 45km2 so not easy to walk around! I didn't realise it was that big!

Right so we had our peer supporter's group today and I put forward a few of the suggestions to increase numbers from this thread.

-The Facebook page was pretty much dismissed immediately as "the NHS wouldn't allow it".

• The buddying idea has apparently been considered, but targetted at people who the mws think would benefit from extra support. This echoes TruthSweet's point above that the group is only seen as necessary for women with bfing problems.

On a plus point, we had three new mums at the group today one of which was given a leaflet about the group when she left hospital.

badger, that's depressing.

Can you get webspace from the PCT or whoever is behind your group? This would also mean that if anyone puts 'breastfeeding support [nameofyourtown]' into Google it might just come up.

The point about a support group is that everyone who is bf should know about it....and be told about it many, many times, so it becomes part of local knowledge.

The only way this can happen - that everyone knows about it - is via the HCPs and if they don't or can't do this, then this is a management issue....just as they have to tell mothers about immunisation sessions, for instance, they have to tell them about bf support. It is seen as professionally negligent not to do so.

Thanks tiktok- I'll ask about webspace.

The second issue about ensuring that HCPs are spreading the word is obviously harder to address.

That's very interesting TikTok, I think I shall have a chat with our NNs about this, I do really get the impression that a bfing peer support drop-in is seen as the place to send mothers who bf who have issues not mothers who bf full stop.

I know I went to the very first bfing group in our town because I wanted to meet other mothers who bf as out of my close 'mummy' friends, 1 formula fed from 3w and one pumped and formula fed, some others bf but seemed quite unphased (?) by bfing (lots of scheduling/wanting to stop asap/etc) and I wanted to know everything was going well [i.e. needed peer support!] and how to continue to bf not how to stop as soon as I could.

I only found out about it as I was bfing outside a cafe in the town centre and got leafleted!

I wonder if we should do that again?