NDC Accreditation, the NDC Lactation Fellowship and the NDC Masterclasses: what each means, and ethical use of the NDC or Possums programs for the benefit of families

What an NDC Accredited Practitioner is

NDC Accredited Practitioners are the only professionals qualified and licensed to deliver Neuroprotective Developmental Care (NDC or The Possums Programs) in clinical practice. They have completed NDC Accreditation with The NDC Institute. NDC Accreditation is restricted to registered health professionals, for example doctors, nurses, midwives, psychologists, and IBCLCs who also hold health professional registration in their own country.

What an NDC Lactation Fellow is

NDC Lactation Fellows are NDC Accredited Practitioners who have completed The NDC Lactation Fellowship, the highest level of professional development The NDC Institute (Possums) offers to registered health professionals. This qualification builds advanced clinical skills across all the Possums domains of care, with specialist depth in breastfeeding and lactation medicine and the research behind it. The Fellowship is open to members of Maintenance of NDC Accreditation.

Using the NDC Accredited name, badge and titles

While they're within their 12-month NDC Accreditation course period or a member of Maintenance of NDC Accreditation, NDC Accredited Practitioners have a licence to

• Advertise their services using NDC or the Possums programs name, online, hardcopy or in social media
• Promote their services using the NDC Accredited badge, online, hardcopy or in social media
• Use the materials in the Resource Hub, including the parent handouts, with their patients and for their own professional benefit

NDC Lactation Fellows may also use the title NDC Lactation Fellow while they're members of Maintenance of NDC Accreditation.

The amount of content available through The NDC Institute is very generous, and mostly generated by Dr Pamela Douglas's life work. She is keen for practitioners to use it, and very grateful to everyone who uses it ethically, so that her work and The NDC Institute can continue.

NDC Accredited Practitioners are listed on The NDC Register unless they choose not to be, and can list their practice on the Find an NDC Practitioner map. The licence is renewed each year through Maintenance of NDC Accreditation. If Maintenance lapses, the licence, the listing and member access are paused, and they come back when the practitioner renews.

The NDC Masterclasses

The NDC Masterclasses are the first step of the NDC Accreditation pathway. Anyone who has completed them can state this in their bio as a completed course. For example:

Dr Jane Smith has completed the NDC Masterclasses in Breastfeeding Medicine: Clinical Assessment and Management (year of completion).

The Masterclasses don't provide an NDC qualification, or the right to promote services as providing NDC or Possums care. That right is limited to registered health professionals who are NDC Accredited, or who are members of Maintenance of NDC Accreditation, to keep the standard of NDC qualifications high, for the sake of mothers and babies. This also protects the value of the qualification for clinicians.

Checking someone's NDC qualification

The NDC Register shows who is currently qualified through The NDC Institute, and explains what each NDC qualification means. The Find an NDC Practitioner map shows NDC Accredited Practitioners online or near you.

The Neuroprotective Developmental Care (NDC) or Possums programs intellectual property

The NDC Institute operates as a social enterprise.

The intellectual property of NDC or Possums comprises

• Around 200 discrete terms or concepts which are unique to NDC or the Possums programs, and which were not in use in the care of mothers and babies, or were used with a different meaning, until developed and applied by Dr Pamela Douglas as part of the NDC or Possums programs. Used in combination, these many terms or concepts comprise the various NDC or Possums programs. They are the clinical and educational translations of the research which underlies the NDC or Possums programs;

• Extensive copyrighted materials, videos, flashcards and text, located in The NDC Institute courses and Resource Hub, in The Possums Parent Programs, and throughout possums.org;

• Trademarked names (e.g. Neuroprotective Developmental Care, The NDC Institute, Possums/The Possums Clinic/the Possums programs, Breastfeeding Stripped Bare, NDC Accredited).

Why respecting the NDC or Possums intellectual property matters

There is an important difference between integrating knowledge and clinical approaches into clinical practice, which The NDC Institute hopes everyone who learns NDC will do, and commercialising or promoting NDC or the Possums name in marketing and advertising, in order to promote and grow the services of a business or institution (e.g. a private practice, a hospital, a family and child health service).

We know that health professionals are interested in including the NDC or Possums name as part of the services listed on their websites and in their promotional materials, because the NDC or Possums name is recognised by the public, and associated with a wide range of specific and effective clinical methods and ethics, different to what families may receive elsewhere.

However, if the Possums programs are to continue to transform the lives of families with babies, Possums and The NDC Institute need to

• Protect the quality and integrity of the programs, so that parents continue to experience them as highly effective
• Ensure the ongoing updating of the professionals who advertise that they deliver the programs.

We hope you agree that it is very important to protect the quality of the Possums name and programs, for the sake of making a genuine difference to the wellbeing of mothers or parents and their little ones.

We believe that the Possums/NDC project will survive and thrive because of the ethical behaviours of those who care about NDC or the Possums programs. Although it's easy to feel disempowered and discouraged because so much unethical behaviour is normalised in the world around us, we believe that NDC or Possums will survive and thrive because of those many human beings who've made a decision to live in a way that aligns with their values - even when no-one is looking.

How to use NDC ethically

We hope that everyone who learns NDC with us takes NDC and makes it their own as they work with families and their babies or toddlers, regardless of how little or how deeply they go into the NDC materials. Using what you know of NDC in your clinical practice is not the same as using the NDC or Possums name to promote your services.

Everyone who studies with The NDC Institute agrees to abide by the NDC Code of Ethics. For NDC Accredited Practitioners and NDC Lactation Fellows, that means:

• Using the NDC Accredited name (or any variation of it), the NDC Accredited badge, the NDC Lactation Fellow title and the NDC resources only while they're within their 12-month course period or a member of Maintenance of NDC Accreditation
• Keeping what they promote aligned with NDC
• Linking back to possums.org whenever they use the NDC name or their qualification in their promotions or presentations
• Linking their NDC Accredited badge to possums.org/ndc-status wherever it appears digitally and can be linked, so that parents, colleagues and employers can quickly confirm they're current
• Using the NDC resources, including the parent handouts, with their own patients only, and not sharing or publishing them
• Prominently letting participants know about possums.org when they use Resource Hub materials to help educate their colleagues
• Acknowledging the influence of NDC or the Possums programs on their own work, whenever it is professionally and ethically appropriate to do so

Anyone who stops being a member of The NDC Institute removes the NDC Accredited badge and any reference to NDC Accreditation, the NDC Lactation Fellow title or the Possums programs from their promotions, other than in their bio, where they might choose to state the year they became NDC Accredited and the year they ceased. They also delete all NDC digital and printed materials. They're welcome to keep using the concepts and principles of NDC in their clinical services, as part of their professional knowledge.

People who have completed the NDC Masterclasses, and professionals without an NDC qualification, are also welcome to use what they know of NDC in their work. We ask that they acknowledge NDC by name when they do, and point families to the free resources on possums.org, and that they don't use the NDC or Possums name to promote their services.

Please email education@possums.org if you notice someone using the Possums or NDC name inappropriately, or please have a quiet chat with them yourself. They may not be aware of the information contained in this article.