GPHC finally boasts baby-friendly status

Aug 21, 2016 News

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By Sharmain Grainger

After many years of trying and failing, the Georgetown Public Hospital Corporation

(GPHC) is finally able to boast of being a ‘baby-friendly’ institution. This essentially means that the hospital is now able to ensure that mothers who deliver in its Maternity Unit breastfeed their babies wherever possible. In cases where breastfeeding is not possible mothers are encouraged to use cups and refrain from introducing their babies to bottles.
However, ‘breast is best’ is the motto that the Maternity Unit is currently operating by.
Given the fact that breastfeeding, which ensures that babies get the right amount of nutrients, has immense benefits for not only babies but mothers as well, health sectors across the globe have for some time been promoting its importance. But for some reason, all the efforts plugged behind promoting this crucial practice have not been embraced by some hospitals.
Here in Guyana desperate efforts are consistently being made to have all hospitals achieve the ‘baby-friendly’ status.
Just recently five hospitals were certified as ‘baby-friendly’ joining six others that already have this status.
Aside from the GPHC, other hospitals recently certified were: Suddie, Oscar Joseph (Region Two) and New Amsterdam and Skeldon (Region Six).
But it was an especially difficult task for the GPHC to attain this status, given the fact that it is the largest hospital in the country, the lone referral and tertiary institution, as well as the regional hospital in Region Four – and thus attracts an unusually large patient traffic.
This state of affairs was revealed by Senior Departmental Supervisor of the Maternity Unit,

Sister Denise Marks during a recent interview. Although Sister Marks only recently assumed the leadership position, she is very well aware that the GPHC had long been struggling for the baby-friendly status. The struggle might have occurred over the past 15 years.
But those who were part and parcel with the struggle are only too elated that the struggle was not in vain.
“I am so excited that we have gotten it now. It means a lot to us, because we are the only referral, teaching hospital with this status, perhaps in the whole Region. This is a big hooray for the Georgetown Hospital,” said an elated Sister Marks.
She reminisced on the many hiccups which at times made achieving the intended goal appear unreachable. The hiccups, according to her, were often linked to the fact that because the GPHC is a referral hospital, its Maternity Unit sometimes had to attend to many sick babies who were not exclusively breastfed.
Attaining the breastfeeding status comes under a Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative (BFHI) which was first launched by the World Health Organisation in 1991, and is a global effort to implement practices that protect, promote and support breastfeeding.
Moreover, Sister Marks noted that attaining the status meant that assessors had to routinely check to ensure that as soon as babies were born they had skin to skin contact with their mothers. But this could not have been done on all occasions.
“There were times we couldn’t have gotten that done because of Caesarean Section births, and some babies are born so small that we just had to rush them to the neonatal unit,” recounted Sister Marks.
But even before she took on the task to steer the Maternity Unit to ‘baby-friendly’ status, she revealed that there were the likes of Sister Majorie Arjune, former Senior Departmental Supervisor, and also Sister June Cato, both of whom were able to put some crucial work in.
Sister Marks recalled many sensitisation sessions for all level of staffers attached to the Unit including attendants, security guards and clerks.
“We had to sensitise them all, because we knew that when the assessors come to the hospital they would interview these persons too,” said Sister Marks as she recalled tireless efforts being made to get mothers on board too.
She added, “We had to teach the mothers (before and after pregnancy) about breastfeeding and question them to see if they were able to grasp the importance of what we were saying…we had workshops, we had various teaching sessions…doctors were involved in these sessions, too, because we knew that all these people had to be a part of the process.”
The end result was staffers of the hospital having an appreciation for encouraging breastfeeding and making things happen in favour of achieving the ‘baby-friendly’ status.
“Our midwives in the birthing room understand that after delivery, as soon as the baby is born, there must be skin to skin touch between mother and baby…our nurses are able to say why that is being done,” noted Sister Marks as she added, “we really, really worked hard to reach where we are today.”
“We owe this one especially to Sister Arjune, because she worked a long time on attaining this, I only took over in the month of June, but she was here years before, putting things in place and it is because of her hard work we have accomplished this feat,” Sister Marks confided.
But there were other nurses who also played instrumental roles in helping to realise the baby-friendly status. These included nurses Shannon Haynes, Michelle Wade, Michelle Pompey, Janessa St. Hill, Diana Grimes, Glenis Mingo and Simone Watson, among others.
And according to Sister Marks, the entire staff at the GPHC is committed to ensuring that the ‘baby-friendly’ status will be retained. The GPHC like the other hospitals certified will be assessed in another two years and, according to Sister Marks, “we will be ready to be re-certified.”
Other hospitals that are certified with the ‘baby friendly’ status include: West Demerara Regional (Region Three), Upper Demerara (Region 10), Davis Memorial, Mahaicony Cottage Hospital (Region Five), Mahdia District (Region Eight) and Lethem Regional (Region Nine).

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