who

we

are

EMMA DEWEY DIRECTOR

Emma is the owner of the childcare and newborn care training agency Babyem, as well as the Babyem Business Academy: a membership program that supports childcare and health practitioners to build successful value-driven businesses.

 

Over the last 10 years, Emma has also worked with childcare organisations internationally, supporting them to build and market their training programs.

 

Prior to Babyem, Emma began her career working in marketing promoting global brands, before retraining and working for a humanitarian aid agency and children services for 10 years.

 

Emma speaks frequently at conferences and has written a number of best practice guidance documents for Local Authorities and Associations, including creating the British Association of Au Pair Agencies (BAPAA) childcare handbook.

 

ANDREA STRANG GENTLE SLEEP COACH

Andrea is a Holistic and Gentle Sleep Consultant, Doula, Adult Insomnia Coach, author, and Practitioner. She holds two university certificates in Advanced Marriage and Family Functioning and Home and Family, from Brigham Young University In her sleep practice, she has helped over 8000 families get better sleep. She also has extensive hands-on experience working with babies throughout the night. Andrea has also spent the past 8 years training and mentoring Sleep Consultants and Night Coaches around the world and has written 3 books related to infant and child sleep.

Charlotte Treitl COMMUNITY SUCCESS MANAGER

Charlotte (she/her/they) is an IBCLC with many years of experience supporting families with infant feeding. Charlotte joined the Babyem team in March 2020 when the pandemic hit, providing administrative support to Emma and the team, and supporting students with their courses through a challenging period. Charlotte is passionate about empowering families and trainees with evidence based, holistic care and information to support their unique needs and goals and has a particular interest in baby poo! Charlotte works on a variety of projects under the Babyem umbrella, always striving to extend our strong community ethos by creating new connections and nurturing established relationships.

Christina Lenz PAEDIATRIC OSTEOPATH

Christina practises both traditional manipulative osteopathy and osteopathy in the cranial field. She has extensive experience working with adults and children. Besides being a practising osteopath, Christina also fulfils academic roles on the postgraduate programmes on paediatric osteopathy at the Osteopathic Centre for Children in London and the Osteopathie-Schule Deutschland in Hamburg. She is Co-author of the book “Pruefungswissen Osteopathie”.

DAVE JOHNSON Paediatric First Aid Trainer

Dave is an experienced First Aid Trainer/Assessor who has extensive experience delivering accredited Paediatric First Aid courses within the childcare sector as well as the voluntary, public and private sector. Dave is also a qualified and licensed Psychotherapist, specializing in child, adolescent and family therapy in schools and colleges as well as his London-based private practice.

DR EMMA Svanberg Clinical Psychologist

Chartered clinical psychologist Dr Emma Svanberg (DClinPsy) is known as The Mumologist and works with parents and parents to be supporting them through their parenting journey. Working as part of a collective, Emma and her colleagues together offer whole-family support in person and through her online community The Village. Emma is a published author and her work has been featured in The Guardian, Marie Claire, BBC News and Mother & Baby. She brings over 10 years of academic and clinical experience to help you understand why this period should not be treated as ‘business as usual’, but is a time of immense pressure and stress for parents.

DR LOUISE CONSULTANT OBSTETRICIAN & GYNAECOLOGIST

Consultant Obstetrician, Gynaecologist & Clinical Director of Clinical Effectiveness & Outcomes at the Chelsea and Westminster Hospital NHS Foundation Trust. When Louise is not practising she is teaching as an honorary senior lecturer at Imperial College, London. She has a special interest in pregnancy in women with underlying medical conditions. Louise aims to support women with their choices for labour and delivery and promotes normality wherever possible. She has an academic interest in Patient Safety working to create safe systems of care within maternity services.

DR PENELOPE LAW CONSULTANT OBSTETRICIAN & GYNAECOLOGIST

Dr Penelope Law, is the author of Expecting a Baby? (One Born Every Minute) is a Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist at the Hillingdon Hospital, London, Honorary Senior Lecturer at Imperial College, London, and Consultant Obstetrician and Gynaecologist at The Portland Hospital
Dr Penelope Law’s research into both obesity in pregnancy and non-invasive procedures for the treatment of fibroids is recognised globally as the preferable alternative to surgery. She is a well-known speaker in these areas of expertise. She is also one of the founders of Night Doctor London, a leading out of hours GP service.

HANNAH ROSE HEAD OF HEALTH – ELVIE

Hannah Rose looks after health and wellness relationships for the award-winning femtech company Elvie, which creates extraordinary products to improve women’s lives, including products to help with the pelvic floor. Hannah Rose helps professionals integrate the Elvie Trainer into the care that they deliver, as well as managing research on the positive impact this has for patients.

Harriet

Harriet Higgins Clinical Psychologist

Harriet is a Clinical Psychologist who specialises in working with parents and their babies in the perinatal period. For the past 14 years she has worked for the NHS providing a Psychology service in children centres. She takes a whole family approach to supporting parents mental health and is passionate about early intervention. 

 

Over the years she has developed a specialist interest in working therapeutically with couples experiencing relationship difficulties during pregnancy or after birth. She also helps parents and their babies with issues such as tokophobia (fear of giving birth), pregnancy loss, birth trauma, difficulties adjusting to parenting, attachment issues and feelings of depression and anxiety in pregnancy and postnatally.

 

Alongside working with parents she is an experienced supervisor and trainer to other Psychologists and mental health/early years practitioners. She is a member of the Association for Infant Mental Health and the Make Birth Better network.

HELEN TURIER SUPPORT SERVICES MANAGER – TAMBA

Helen has been Support Services Manager for Tamba since August 2014 and she is also a mother of twins. She qualified as a nurse in 1984 and has extensive experience in health promotion, telephone triage, coaching, education and training . Helen is responsible for overseeing all our support services including Twinline, Specialist support groups, honorary consultants, helping hands, expectant and parenting courses and engaging with maternity units in England and Wales.

Jackie Fisher PAEDIATRIC FIRST AID TRAINER

Jackie is a qualified Early Years Practitioner, Assessor, Trainer and Paediatric First Aid Instructor with over 25 years in the early years/care and education sectors. Jackie has managed a large nursery, after school clubs, and regularly consultants for Local Authorities.

Kay Crotty CONSULTANT PELVIC FLOOR PHYSIOTHERAPIST

Kay began her physiotherapy career in the musculoskeletal arena having undertaken post graduate training both in the UK and Canada. She established Physiolink in 1990. Building on her spinal background she diversified into Pelvic Floor Muscle Dysfunction and is now one of the leading physiotherapists in this field in the UK. She completed a programme of research investigating pelvic floor exercises in collaboration with The University of Hertfordshire and Northwick Park and St Mark’s Hospitals. Kay has published and presented her research internationally and in Spring 2008 was awarded the prize for best scientific presentation at the annual conference of CSUK (Continence Society UK). Her doctoral degree was awarded in June 2014.

LISA PASCOULIS Paediatric First Aid Trainer

Lisa is a first aid instructor and assessor, with extensive experience coordinating first aid training for St Johns Ambulance as well as delivering courses for schools and within the corporate sector. Lisa is regularly cited in national newspapers as well as for the BBC and ITV.

LOUISE BELAND OSTEOPATH AND TONGUE TIE PRACTITIONER

Louise Beland is an Osteopath and Tongue-tie Practitioner who also specialises in infant feeding issues, musculoskeletal problems in adults and children, and pregnancy-related musculoskeletal problems (SPD, PGP).

Louise has contributed to the level 4 course and explores how osteopathy can support an infant with tongue-tie.

Lyndsey Hookway holistic sleep coach

Lyndsey is an experienced Paediatric Nurse, Health Visitor and International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and Holistic Sleep Coach. As an International speaker, Lyndsey regularly teaches health, lactation and childcare professionals. She is also the co-founder and clinical director of the Holistic Sleep Coaching Program, and the author of Holistic Sleep Coaching and Let’s talk about your new family’s sleep and has written a number of published articles.

LYNN MURPHY BABY MASSAGE SPECIALIST

Lynn Murphy has been supporting women through the journey of pregnancy & birth into motherhood for the last 25 years, initially within her role as an active birth and yoga teacher, and a teacher of massage & movement for babies. Her work has developed to now include one-to-one coaching for new mothers as well as Birth Debrief and Birth Trauma Recovery sessions. Lynn’s enrichment trainings and mentoring for practitioners working within the perinatal period include her – Baby & Me Nurture – that focuses on the all-important fourth trimester. Lynn draws on her experience and knowledge of over two decades of working with new mothers & babies and also as a mother and grandmother herself,  to better support new mothers and honour the transformational journey that Matrescence is.

MAGS KIRK SPEECH AND LANGUAGE THERAPIST

Mags Kirk is a Speech and Language Therapist who specialises in assessing and treating children with a wide range of speech, language and feeding difficulties. Mags has a Masters degree in Applied Behaviour Analysis and has a passion for working with children who have an Autistic Spectrum Disorder, having qualified in Talk Tools (level 3), PROMPT (bridging), PECS, Makaton level 4, Lidcombe Stammering, Verbal Behaviour (ABA), Bobath approach (Cerebral Palsy), Dysphagia management and Johansen Individualised Auditory Stimulation Therapy.

 

Mags has contributed to the level 4 course and explores the impact of tongue-tie on speech and language.

MAUREEN MINCHIN MEDICAL HISTORIAN

Maureen Minchin is a world renowned medical historian whose 1970s experience of motherhood resulted in her second book, Food for Thought: a parent’s guide to food intolerance, recognized as ground breaking in its treatment of infant allergy. Her third book, Breastfeeding Matters, was declared a “milestone in the history of breastfeeding” by Prof JD Baum. For 35 years she has worked extensively in the area of infant nutrition, including for WHO, and UNICEF, and teaching health professionals in Australia and overseas. She was influential in the creation of IBLCE and BFHI, and a founding (and later Board) member of both ILCA and ALCA. Maureen has continued to work free of charge with families with both infant feeding and allergy problems. Her latest book, Milk Matters: Infant Feeding and Immune Disorder was published in 2015.

Rebecca CONSULTANT PERINATAL PSYCHIATRIST & CLINICAL PSYCHOLOGIST

Rebecca is a perinatal psychiatrist working in the NHS and privately providing assessments for women with anxiety and depression in the postnatal period, PTSD, Birth Trauma, issues related to infertility or premenstrual syndrome. Rebecca has 20 years of experience in Psychiatry and has been a perinatal psychiatrist in London’s only outstanding NHS rated trust for the past nine years. Rebecca has been quoted in or interviewed for a broad range of regional and national and publications including: Daily Mail, Royal College of Psychiatrists Perinatal Quality Network Newsletter, PLOS, Psychology Today, Broadly, Selfish Mother and Well Doing.

SARAH OAKLEY TONGUE SPECIALIST

Sarah Oakley’s background is in community and practices nursing and health visiting. In 2009 she left the NHS to focus on breastfeeding and set up a private practice having qualified as an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant. In 2011 she trained at Southampton to perform frenulotomy and has done over 3000 procedures privately since. She regularly provides training for healthcare professionals and breastfeeding supporters in infant feeding and tongue tie and continues to run two breastfeeding support groups. She is a founder member and former Chair of The Association of Tongue-tie Practitioners.

SHEL BANKS INFANT FEEDING SPECIALIST

Shel is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant with extensive experience within the NHS in research, training and project management. Her own successful private practice assists mothers and babies with feeding issues, and she also works in the tertiary sector with various national organisations.
She is the author of “Why Formula Feeding Matters”, and is currently working on the Cochrane systematic reviews on Infantile Colic. Shel is heavily involved in the voluntary sector being the Vice-Chair for the UK Association of Milk Banking, and Chair of Communications Team for the Lactation Consultants of Great Britain.

tracey twist

Tracey Twist EARLY YEARS CONSULTANT & PAEDIATRIC FIRST AID INSTRUCTOR

Tracey has been working in childcare training for over 20 years, working in the voluntary, public and private sector, delivering short courses as well as qualifications. As a previous expert panellist member for the awarding body CACHE, and current subject matter expert for Highfield, Tracey has considerable experience writing national course curriculum. Tracey is also a qualified Paediatric First Aid trainer and has delivered many courses to Local Authorities, Schools and Childcare establishments across the country.

Vanessa Christie LACTATION CONSULTANT

Vanessa Christie is a registered Lactation Consultant, Registered Health Visitor, Registered Nurse (Children) and Certified Infant Massage Instructor. She is the author of ‘The Baby Feeding Book’, and has worked with thousands of families over the last 16 years in a variety of settings including acute paediatric medical and surgical wards, neonatal intensive care and neonatal special care units, GP surgeries, children’s centres, schools, nurseries and private homes.