Improving Maternal and Infant Nutrition: A Framework for Action

Parents Cooking Group, Gowans Child & Family Centre, PerthThe purpose of the group is to improve participants’ basic cooking skills, basicnutrition and hygiene awareness. Sessions cover product labelling, health and safetyin the cooking environment, weekly menu and shopping planning, budgeting,preparing and cooking meals. The target group is parents with children under theage of five attending the Centre which is situated in a regeneration area. Staff workwith some of the most difficult to engage parents and carers with a range of issuesincluding poor attachment relationships, substance misuse, lack of finance, low selfesteem and negative experience of the education system.When the parents join the group they are asked to complete a questionnaire, thisgives an indication of the types of meals they are making at present and the facilitiesthey have at home. Sessions are then modified to suit the individual needs of theparents. Parents are encouraged to use the skills learned at home and to try toprepare cost effective nutritious meals for their families, especially their youngchildren. Evaluation is carried out at the end of the course to determine what skillshave been learned and if family eating habits have changed.For further information contact: Norma Aberdein, Gowans Child & Family Centre,naberdein@pkc.gov.uk4.39 All the community and voluntary organisations surveyed said that work was inplace to improve the nutrition of children under the age of five. This work includedhealthy eating and cookery courses and provision of fresh fruit to nurseries. The keyobjectives of this work included raising awareness of the importance of a healthybalanced diet, especially on a low income, ensuring that children and parents haveaccess to a variety of choices and information, getting parents to learn aboutdifferent food groups, and encouraging healthy eating in the family home.4.40 Funding came from a number of sources including grants from the FairerScotland Fund, the NHS, community health initiatives, and lottery funding. Variousgroups and organisations were involved in this type of work including nurseries,playgroups, parent and toddler groups, healthy living initiative staff, local volunteers,as well as NHS and local authority staff. In most cases (9) work was being targetedat specific groups such as young parents with addictions or areas of deprivation.Conclusion4.41 The analysis indicates that support for breastfeeding is well establishedacross most parts of Scotland. Several Boards have achieved UNICEF BabyFriendly accreditation in their maternity units, and although all Community HealthPartnerships (CHPs) have plans to progress this, no CHP has accreditation acrossall community premises. The breastfeeding health improvement target may havebeen a useful tool in focusing attention on this within NHS Boards and also localauthorities. In all cases, Health Boards lead work on breastfeeding with someexamples of partnership working with local authorities and the community andvoluntary sector to deliver specific programmes. Reliance on volunteers and shorttermfunding emerges as an issue which may affect the sustainability of peer supportprogrammes.