Are you Baby-Friendly? Knowledge deficit among US maternity staff.

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: The Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative began in 1991. In 2010, approximately 3% of United States (US) hospitals were Baby-Friendly certified. When collecting data for related studies, we noted that many maternity staff erroneously claimed their hospital was Baby-Friendly.™ OBJECTIVE: To determine whether maternity staff in US hospitals could accurately describe their institution's status with regard to Baby-Friendly certification. METHODS: In 2010-2011, we called all maternity hospitals in the US and asked to be connected to the maternity service. We then asked the person answering the maternity service phone "Is your hospital a Baby-Friendly hospital?" and recorded the position of the respondent. RESULTS: We called 2974 hospitals, and received answers on Baby-Friendly status from 2851. According to the Baby-Friendly USA Website (http//www.babyfriendlyusa.org), 3% (75/2851) of these hospitals were Baby-Friendly. However, staff at 62% (1780/2851) stated their hospital was Baby-Friendly. Staff at 15% (424/2851) did not know what the caller meant by "Baby-Friendly hospital." Accuracy of knowledge varied dependent on the respondent's job title (P < .001). International Board Certified Lactation Consultants were most likely to be accurate, with 89% answering correctly. There was a strong positive correlation between the proportion of Baby-Friendly hospitals and the proportion of correct responses by state (r = 0.62, P < .001). CONCLUSION: Although the Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative was established over 20 years ago, most US maternity staff responding to a telephone survey either incorrectly believed their hospital to be Baby-Friendly certified or were unaware of the meaning of "Baby-Friendly hospital."