Fatherhood Institute have published a new report and supporting resources which they hope will support efforts to build more father-inclusive services for families in the first postnatal year. They are launching to coincide with Father's Day, but they hope the reports and other assets will have a much longer shelf-life, of course ....
Bringing Baby Home
Bringing Baby Home is the fifth in their series of Contemporary Fathers in the UK evidence reviews, funded by the Nuffield Foundation. It draws on a systematically collected body of almost 800 pieces of research exploring fathers and fatherhood in the first year – including many studies based on the UK’s three large-scale birth cohort studies, which track children’s outcomes over decades.
Within the report you will find good and bad news.
- The good news: lots of interesting and useful findings about new fathers in the UK - who they are, what they do in the year after their babies’ birth, and the impact they have on their children and children’s mothers.
- The bad news: services are not engaging with, assess or support fathers, despite a sea-change in fathers’ involvement in recent decades, and evidence of the many ways their health and behaviours impact on babies and mothers.
You can download and share the main report, executive summary & recommendations here:
http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/bringing-baby-home/
Factsheets
They've produced a series of free factsheets which summarise key findings from the report – to a) help new fathers make sense of their impact, even if services are not addressing them, and b) provide a clear rationale for the health professionals, employers and others around them, to value and support dads in the vital first year of their babies’ lives.
The factsheets are available to download and share here:
http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/happy-fathers-day/
Calls to action
They hope you will find all this useful, and would like to ask you to support the work in three ways:
Share the report
From 13 June onwards, please help them promote Bringing Baby Home to your networks. The more we can get the report out to NHS and other colleagues, and to families themselves, the more likely we are to build effective action to develop more father-inclusive services. With Father’s Day happening on 19 June, there’s a great opportunity to get word out about how much dads matter…so please consider promoting the report in your Father’s Day communications. If you’d like some less ‘time sensitive’ assets, just email me!
Text to use on websites, in newsletters etc:
Bringing Baby Home, a review of evidence about UK fathers in the first postnatal year, has found that NHS systems are not set up to engage with, assess and support new dads – despite clear evidence that their physical and mental health impact on babies’ future health and wellbeing, including heightened risk of obesity, respiratory problems and impaired cognitive development. Find out more, and what can be done to make services more father-inclusive, here http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/bringing-baby-home/.
Sample tweets:
Let’s do more to support new dads. Check out Bringing Baby Home, a @fatherhoodinst evidence review about first-year fatherhood #fathersday #timewithdad
http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/bringing-baby-home/
First-year fatherhood: impactful and unsupported. Check out Bringing Baby Home, an important evidence review by @fatherhoodinst #fathersday #timewithdad
http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/bringing-baby-home/
Babies and mums deserve well-supported dads. Bringing Baby Home by @fatherhoodinst sets out why fathers matter in the first postnatal year #fathersday #timewithdad
http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/bringing-baby-home/
Share the factsheets
They’ve designed these to be useful for practitioners and for families themselves – so again, please help us promote them in the period around Father’s Day.
Text to use on websites, newsletters etc:
First-year fathers are hugely important to their children, as well as to mothers – but services tend to overlook or ignore them. A new series of factsheets from the Fatherhood Institute sets out key research messages about why dads matter. Download them here http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/happy-fathers-day/
Sample tweets:
New dad? Find out how much you matter this #fathersday by reading these @fatherhoodinst factsheets http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/happy-fathers-day/ #timewithdad
Know an expectant or new dad? Send him these @fatherhoodinst factsheets about why he really matters this #fathersday http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/happy-fathers-day/
New mum? Show dad these @fatherhoodinst factsheets about why he really matters this #fathersday http://www.fatherhoodinstitute.org/2022/happy-fathers-day/ #timewithdad
1. Join and promote our webinars
Finally, they still have a few slots available at our online Bringing Baby Home launch webinar, happening on Thursday 16 June at 12.30 to 13.30.
Here’s the link: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/349506241577
We’re also speaking at a First 1001 Days webinar on Wednesday 29 June at 13.00 to 14.00.
Here’s the link: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/first-1001-days-webinar-bringing-baby-home-tickets-360470826947.