Parenting Support

Nurses & Nurturing Nurseries

Having a baby can leave parents both overjoyed and overwhelmed. It takes a village to raise a healthy, well-adjusted child, and VNA is proud to be an expert resource parents can rely on. VNA offers four voluntary home visitation programs for at-risk families with infants or small children. Our goal is to empower parents to maintain self-sufficient, healthy, happy families.

• Healthy Families America
• Project WIN
• Love & Learn
• Nurse Family Partnership

Curriculum

The Growing Great Kids™ curriculum is used during home visits with families. It is a highly-interactive, strengths-based approach that builds nurturing parent-child relationships and promotes parenting skills that support the early learning and development of infants and young children.

Other Services

Families participating in any of the programs have these additional services available to them:

• Breastfeeding support — Home visits by certified lactation consultants help pregnant women and new moms learn the benefits and the process of breastfeeding, and are provided with ongoing support to meet their breastfeeding goals.
• Car seats and cribs — Convertible infant car seats and portable cribs are available to families with limited resources to ensure safe sleep and motor vehicle safety.
• Childbirth education classes — Parents can learn about what to expect before, during and after childbirth through classes taught by VNA professionals, at no cost. Sign up early!
• Community referrals — VNA social workers and parent coaches assist families with accessing housing, food and other resources in the community.
• Physician-ordered mother and child visits

Mom’s Everyday

Catch Visiting Nurse Association experts on Mom’s Everyday.

Our own Mary Foley was featured on Mom’s Everyday talking about the importance of reading. Make reading fun every day with a good book! The first five years are especially important to read to your child because that is when 90 percent of brain development is happening – you can even read to your children before they are born!

Kaiya Mears from VNA was also on Mom’s Everyday. She talked about breastfeeding, the sacred hour, skin-to-skin contact and all of the great resources that are out there for new mothers!