Parental Knowledge on Breastfeeding: Contributions to a Clinical Supervision Model in Nursing

Abstract

A quantitative and cross sectional study was conducted on a non-probability sample consisting of 135 recent mothers. The enquiry form applied allowed the assessment of parental skills on breastfeeding and in determining the conditions for the development of these skills. Most women (63%) provided information on the benefits of breastfeeding, 75% of the mothers did not show familiarity with strategies on how to continue breastfeeding. The study pointed to the existence of practices that impair the progress of acknowledgement on breastfeeding and contribute to early withdrawal, such as: delay in breastfeeding initiation, early introduction to infant formula, lack of nurses' guidance and support on breastfeeding, during the post-partum period. Clinical supervision can be a means for the development of nursing skills allowing a widespread improvement of practices and rates (exclusivity and duration) of breastfeeding, boosting parent's capacity, security, trust and satisfaction, which regards breastfeeding.Index Terms-Breastfeeding, clinical supervision, nursing care quality, parental skills. I. INTRODUCTIONThe practice of breastfeeding is an indicator of the quality of the child's and the mother's health and consequently of perinatal health care. Breastfeeding rates in Portugal are well below the recommended, in particular those concerning exclusive breastfeeding [1].Clinical supervision (CS) in nursing is a dynamic effort that maintains and develops the professional practice contributing to the safety and to the quality of care. In the present study, it is expected that the diagnosis of the situation and the proposal of a supervision model will contribute to the development of parental skills in breastfeeding.Clinical supervision is a dynamic, interactive, mediating, facilitating and experiential learning enhancer process, based on a relationship of trust and help among all stakeholders, where each one performs functions and establishes strategies [2], [3] in order to achieve a common purpose -the supervisor's personal and professional development. Reference [4] refers to it as an educational process, focusing on the development of skills, aiming organizational objectives. In this design, the clinical supervision is presented as a means to attain certain quality standards, optimize health indicators, increasingly demanded by institutions. Reference [5] states that the main purpose of clinical supervision is to increase the quality of care and through it supervisees achieve, continue and develop high quality practices. Reference [6] adds that supervision nowadays is one of the most important dimensions in promoting quality processes and accreditation, given the benefits it offers as far as assistance is concerned. Thus, there is a greater emphasis on integrating clinical supervision in the process of continuous care quality improvement [7].Although scarce, there are studies that show the benefits of clinical supervision on improving customer satisfaction and overall care quality. They indicate that the implementatio...

Clinical Supervision and Emotional Intelligence Capabilities: E Excellence in Clinical Practice

“…17). Nursing is a practical profession where clinical supervision is a process for quality and safety of care (Santos, França, Fernandes & Cruz, 2015) leading nurses to excellence in their performance.…”