An Assessment Tool for Evaluating Hospital Breastfeeding Policies and Practices

In 1991, UNICEF and WHO launched the Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative, a global initiative promoting breastfeeding within hospitals. This article describes the development and use of a detailed questionnaire to acquire baseline data on hospital breastfeeding policies in the southeastern Pennsylvania Delaware Valley and to classify hospitals by their level of implementation of the Baby Friendly Hospital Initiative. The purpose of the questionnaire is twofold: a) to describe and analyze hospitals' breastfeeding policies and practices, and b) to classify hospitals with respect to their level of implementation of each of the Ten Steps and the implementation of the Ten Steps overall.