
Job requirements
Essential
12 listedRequirements the employer expects applicants to meet.
- Skills
Excellent communication skills – verbal and documentation
- Skills
Good time management skills
- Skills
Able to prioritize and appropriately triage competing demands
- Skills
Work well within the MDT and have a good understanding of limitations
- Skills
Be a confident advocate for families
- Qualifications
UNICEF BFI Management Course/Peer Counsellor course or other equivalent higher breastfeeding training
- Knowledge & Understanding
Good level of written and spoken English
- Knowledge & Understanding
Awareness and/or experience of the Unicef Baby Friendly Initiative
- Knowledge & Understanding
Knowledge of local, national and global strategies relevant to breastfeeding and infant feeding
- Knowledge & Understanding
Understanding of peer support programmes, how they work and why they work
- Knowledge & Understanding
Good understanding of breast anatomy, mechanism of breastfeeding, factors required to breastfeed and able to identify barriers to achieve this.
- Knowledge & Understanding
Good understanding of how to support parents to safely and responsively formula feed.
Desirable
Not listed in the available specification.
Job overview
Infant Feeding Support Worker
Division: Women, Children and Young People
Care Group: Women’s Care
Band: 4
Salary: £28,392 - £31,157 per annum pro rata
Interview Date: expected to be held the week commencing 02 November 2026
We are recruiting for an Infant Feeding Support Worker who shares our ambition and vision to deliver the Best of Care by the Best People and has the drive to take us forward, by ensuring that the Trust continues to be the first choice for patients and our staff.
Main duties of the job
- The post holder will work as an integral part of our Infant Feeding team to deliver high quality, family-centred support to the population of Medway and Swale. The Infant feeding team are externally funded by Medway Council as part of their Start for Life funding. The aim of our team is to support all families who have care at Medway hospital from pregnancy until 6 weeks postnatally. We offer support through antenatal education, specialist clinics, inpatient support, home visits and social group facilitation. As we are a Level 3 BFI Accredited Trust, the post-holder will work in collaboration with the Infant Feeding Specialist Midwife to uphold the UNICEF BFI standards. They will deliver evidence based infant feeding support, and have meaningful feeding conversations in both the antenatal and postnatal period. They will be willing to undertake training courses to enhance their existing knowledge.
Our values are Bold, Every Person Counts, Sharing and Open and Together. It is important that you understand and to refer to our values when completing your application and always reflect our values throughout your employment with the Trust.
We are committed to endorsing diversity, multiculturalism, and inclusion; our policies / procedures ensure that all applicants are treated fairly at every stage of the recruitment process.
To contribute to our exciting future and become part of our team, apply today.
Detailed job description and main responsibilities
The post-holder will strive to support our families with the most complex feeding needs, and reduce the impact of the biggest risk factors for feeding related issues and readmission.
The post-holder will practice throughout the maternity unit but will primarily be based on the postnatal ward and within the community,
The post-holder will be eager to provide Antenatal and Postnatal education to our families in both small and large groups, virtually and face to face. Always complying with the Medway NHS Foundation Trust Infant Feeding Guidelines and policies.
Key Responsibilities
- To ensure all women receive appropriate support and advice with their chosen method of feeding
- To support mothers to develop their relationship with their babies in the antenatal and postnatal period, to facilitate brain development and attachment
- To work in collaboration with the Infant Feeding Lead and Support Midwife and assist them to give family centred support, and referral if appropriate
- To help the Infant Feeding lead maintain the UNICEF standards throughout the trust
- Offer specialist support and guidance to facilitate mothers to initiate and sustain breastfeeding - across a multitude of settings e.g. community, hospital, group settings and over the phone
- Support mothers with complex breastfeeding needs e.g. multiple births, babies on NICU, pre-term babies.
- Identify when feeding is not going well and refer to multidisciplinary services appropriately - e.g. specialist feeding clinic, health visiting, neonatal doctors
- To support and/or facilitate breastfeeding support groups and provide antenatal and postnatal education
- Working with antenatal women and their families to promote the service and the benefits of breastfeeding
- Help collect data, statistics and feedback to use for audit and to improve the service
- To provide face to face and telephone feeding support to families, up to 6 weeks post birth, both in the hospital setting and community setting.
Applicant requirements
This post is subject to the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 (Exceptions) Order 1975 (Amendment) (England and Wales) Order 2020 and it will be necessary for a submission for Disclosure to be made to the Disclosure and Barring Service.
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Applying for this NHS job
This advert is for Infant Feeding Support Worker with Medway NHS Foundation Trust in Gillingham, England. It is listed as a Band 4 Support worker role. The advertised salary is £28,392 - £31,157 per annum pro rata. The contract type is 7 months (fixed term). The application deadline is 03 Nov 2026.
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