Table 3.

The 10 steps to successful breastfeeding for hospitals and birth centres

• Maintain a written breastfeeding policy that is routinely communicated to all health‐care staff

• Train all health‐care staff in skills necessary to implement this policy

• Inform all pregnant women about the benefits and management of breastfeeding

• Help mothers initiate breastfeeding within 1 h of birth

• Show mothers how to breastfeed and how to maintain lactation, even if they are separated from their infants

• Give infants no food or drink other than breastmilk, unless medically indicated

• Practise ‘rooming in’– allow mothers and infants to remain together 24 hours a day

• Encourage unrestricted breastfeeding

• Give no pacifiers or artificial nipples to breastfeeding infants

• Foster the establishment of breastfeeding support groups and refer mothers to them on discharge from the hospital or clinic