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Early Responsive Nurturing Care
Identifying pathways to scale up & integrate nurturing care
Dr. Gabriela Buccini
Gabriela Buccini, Ph.D., MSc, IBCLC, is an Assistant Professor of Social and Behavioral Health. Trained in Epidemiology, Public Health Maternal Child Nutrition, and Implementation Science. She applies mixed-methods research guided through the lens of Complex Adaptive Systems (CAS), Socioecological Model, and the Nurturing Care framework to investigate maternal and child health and nutrition, including breastfeeding & infant feeding, food insecurity, and early childhood development inequities.
Framework
Nurturing Care Framework (NCF). The NCF is a roadmap to ensure that children reach their full potential, and is the framework that guides the early childhood development aspect of the project. The five domains of the Nurturing Care Framework (NCF) being utilized in this study are good health, adequate nutrition , safety and security, opportunities for early learning, and responsive caregiving.
Pillars
Responsive caregiving refers to the ability of a caregiver to respond to their child’s needs, gestures, sounds and verbal requests.
Good health refers to the health of a child and their caregiver that promotes overall well-being and physical and mental development. This domain focuses on both promotive and preventive health resources that aid our target population.
Adequate nutrition is defined as an infants and caregiver’s access to healthful and nutritious foods.
Safety and security is defined as public environments that provide children and their caregivers safety from environmental dangers.
Opportunities for early learning include resources that provide an infant, toddler, or child environment that promotes education and positive interactions with others.