Baby Safe Program

Developed by Associate Professor Rosemarie Boland

Taking your newborn baby home is an incredibly exciting time, but many parents feel daunted by the responsibility that comes with caring for a baby.

Recognising signs of serious illness and knowing when and where to seek help is essential knowledge for all parents and caregivers.  Would you know what to do in an emergency?

We developed the Baby Safe Program to provide parents and grandparents with the latest evidence-based guidance on safe sleeping, recognising signs of serious illness in young babies, knowing when and where to seek professional help and how to provide essential first aid in a baby emergency. 

We can provide you with the knowledge and skills to deal with an emergency in the first year of your baby’s life with confidence.  Our programs are designed to cover the essentials of baby safety, without being too overwhelming or too technical.

All our programs have been developed by Associate Professor Rosemarie Boland, Director of Precious Care Australia. 

Baby Safe Program: Class Formats

We offer a range of classes and options including: 

What topics are covered in a Baby Safe program?

In our series of classes and videos, we cover the following topics: 

  • Safe sleep environment to reduce the risk of Sudden Unexpected Death in Infancy
  • Safe wrapping versus use a safe sleeping bag
  • Recognising signs of an unwell baby
  • Seeking professional help: who, where and when
  • Managing illness in the first few months after birth: fever, croup, and bronchiolitis
  • Rashes
  • Vomiting and possetting 
  • Bath and water safety 
  • When to call for help in an emergency
  • Baby First Aid/Baby Basic Life Support, including: 
    - Baby cardio-pulmonary resuscitation (Baby CPR)
    - Management of choking on food
    - Management of choking on milk
    - Febrile Convulsions
    - Button Battery ingestion
    - Prevention of drowning- bath and water safety

Who should attend a Baby Safe Program?

Our programs are specifically designed for: 

  • Expectant parents
  • Parents of babies: newborns to one year
  • Parents with a baby in NICU or SCN preparing for discharge home
  • Parents of preterm babies recently discharged home
  • Grandparents
  • Nannies and babysitters
  • Older siblings (16 years and over)

Meet the Director

Associate Professor Rosemarie Boland (PhD, MN, RN, RM)


Associate Professor Rosemarie Boland (PhD) is a newborn educator, neonatal intensive care nurse and midwife with over 30 years experience. She specialises in providing first aid training for parents of newborn babies and ex-premature infants. In addition, she develops training programs, clinical practice guidelines and resources for medical, nursing, midwifery and paramedic healthcare professionals in Victoria in her role as a statewide perinatal educator with the neonatal emergency retrieval team.

A/Professor Rose Boland has over 25 peer reviewed publications, has written text book chapters and helps develop guidelines for Ambulance Victoria around obstetric and newborn emergencies. 

The Baby Safe Program was developed by A/Professor Rose Boland.  

Learn more about A/Professor Rose Boland here. 

Meet our Senior Educator

Narelle Wiseman (MN, RN)

Narelle Wiseman is a newborn educator and neonatal intensive care nurse with over 23 years experience caring for newborn babies. 

Narelle has worked in a variety of neonatal settings, including the Royal Women's Hospital neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), Monash Children's Hospital NICU, and in the Special Care Nursery (SCN) at Sandringham Hospital. She has also worked as a  statewide educator with the Newborn Emergency Transport Service, Victoria. Narelle is currently the Nurse Unit Manager of the SCN at Cabrini Hospital. 

In addition to working in Melbourne, Narelle has also worked in NICU in the United Kingdom.  From 2018-2021, Narelle was a lecturer at the University of Melbourne, working with A/Professor Rose Boland to run the neonatal intensive care post-graduate course and the Special Care of the Newborn postgraduate program. 

Learn more about Narelle Wiseman here.

 




Testimonials

What do our clients say about the Baby Safe Program?

Being a new mum and only helping my friends kids previously, I (like many others) am flying blind. So it's a relief to have the opportunity to learn, interact with other parents and obtain knowledge from Rose who has such vast experience, and across multiple facets of the industry! I found the overall curriculum and each specific course within it to be fantastic- really useful, practical and interactive. Rose is wonderful at keeping people engaged too! Thank you so very much, I really appreciate your wisdom.  

Elenore, May 2023  

Dr Rosemarie 's Safe Sleeping and Baby Safe Classes were hands-down the best investment we made prior to our daughter's arrival.  We found the classes stacked full of up-to-date research and evidence-based information. We were also able to practice some of the techniques in class which was a great way to cement the learning. My husband and I now feel confident about identifying rashes that are worthy of medical attention, how to deal with choking, conduct CPR, but also everyday things like signs to look for that our baby is distressed, how to dress her for, and put her to bed, and products for newborns that sound wonderful but actually present risks. 

We left the classes feeling empowered and informed. Dr Rose is at the forefront of a lot of Sudden Infant Death prevention education, and we are so grateful she spends time with parents-to-be, spreading her knowledge. The classes are also a great opportunity to meet other new parents in a relaxed and interactive environment. Cannot recommend highly enough! 

Pauline and Stephen, November 2021

Rosemarie  is fantastic. We were so impressed with her up-to-date knowledge, practicality and experience. Great service and we'd recommend it to all parents to be, grandparents and support people. 

Kate and Fletch, August 2021

We can't express enough how enjoyable and highly valuable we found our small private class with Rose. She is so friendly, warm and funny it felt like a very welcoming and safe environment which was so lovely. 

From taking us through safe sleeping to first aid and beyond, we felt so at ease with Rose and were able to ask questions at any stage and get thorough well-informed advice. Having only us allowed Rose to check our form and guide us through areas we were complete novices at, like swaddling and what to do during choking. 

We came away from the class so much more confident in what to do in the unexpected times of parenthood and the extra resources and support Rose provides following is invaluable. We had found other antenatal classes only to cover the bare essentials, where Rose was able to go more in depth and really allow us to gain our confidence. 

We will be recommending anyone and everyone to sign up to Rose's class. Thank you again for everything! 

Greer and Aidan, February 2021 

We had a great experience attending a baby safety class with Rose. She was so knowledgeable and had a very hands on approach which we found valuable. There is only so much information you can take in from online research. She provided a relaxed and caring environment for us to learn and patiently answered all our questions. Rose was happy to adapt the class to include areas we were anxious about or required extra information. Would highly recommend attending one of these classes!

Jess and Andrew, December 2019

Attending the Baby Safe Class with Rose was without doubt the most excellent and reassuring thing we have done as part of or preparation for parenthood. Prior to the class, we had been fairly conscientious anyway, and read a few books that had been recommended by our doctor, so we felt well prepared. But the course taught us so much that we couldn’t have learnt from textbooks. Rose’s breadth of experience and research, evidence-based approach to all recommendations is exactly what you need as a new parent – it is so easy to fall into the trap of learning everything via internet research, but Rose is the real deal! I will absolutely be recommending this class to all of our expecting friends.

Lucy and Jarrod, August 2018

We attended Rose’s baby safety class ahead of the arrival of our first child. The class is evidence and information rich while being full of practical advice and hands-on learning. It was the most well presented class my husband and I attended when preparing for our newborn. Not only because of the content which is quite literally ‘life-saving’, but also because of Rose’s teaching style which gives us confidence that we might just recall some of this critical advice in what would be a VERY stressful moment.

 S and L, August 2017