SW Washington Healthy Families 7th Annual Conference 2025

Join SW WA Healthy Families, in partnership with Clark County Public Health, for our 7th annual educaiton conference on Wednesday October 22, 2025 at the beautiful ilani resort. The theme Nurturing Health, Honoring Culture: Empowering Families Through Every Journey will guide this year's discussion.

Who shall attend this conference:

This conference convenes a diverse set of clinical, community, advocacy, lactation consultants, nurses, midwives, community health workers, and other healthcare providers who interact with pregnant and postpartum families.

This conference is a catalyst for action, empowering our community to address the structural inequities of lactation care and support that prevent our families from meeting their infant feeding goals.

Why choose this conference?

This conference is the only SW WA specific conference for lactation and maternal child health. All sessions are designed to provide the attendee with professional development opportunities and current clinical and practical lactation knowledge.

Info: These are challenging times in which to live, work, play, and deliver public health and care services. Like many sectors, maternal child health providers are facing increased demands with fewer resources and security. This can lead to exhaustion and burnout. Meanwhile, eroding social and financial systems are also impacting the families they serve. Individually and collectively, we need language and tools to resource ourselves. This 1.25-hour session will review tools for self-care, including nervous system regulation during crisis. Time will be allotted for paired and table engagement with colleagues. The session content will also cover the Continuity of Care Toolkit: Blueprint for Communities (NACCHO & USBC), and Infant and Young Child Feeding in Emergencies (IYCF-E). Both provide equity-informed frameworks for trauma-informed practices that hold everyone in care while building community resources.

Info: Over the past 3 years, flange fittings in my practice have evolved from non-existence to a 30 min adventure. Pumping parents are always shocked where they end up and amazed at how much milk they see. In this session you will learn how properly fitting flanges impact milk supply, nipple pain, and the entire pumping experience. If your clients are using flanges that came in the box, you can quite literally change their life!

Info: This session explores how to support families navigating substance use during pregnancy and the postpartum period through a trauma-informed care lens. Participants will learn how trauma influences substance use and parenting, and how to engage families with empathy, respect, and nonjudgmental, strength-based perinatal and lactation support. Attendees will gain practical tools to reduce stigma, foster trust, and create safe, supportive environments for both parents and infants. The session will also include a powerful panel of mothers with lived experience of substance use during pregnancy, offering firsthand insights into the challenges they faced and the support that made a difference.

Info: Families in Southwest Washington deserve continuity of care throughout their prenatal, birth, and postpartum journeys. True continuity isn’t achieved through resource lists, but through relationships. This workshop will facilitate those connections. Organized in a “World Café” style, this interactive 1.5-hour session will have participants on their feet and connecting with purpose. In the first round, community providers focused on prenatal and birth services will set up simple displays throughout the room. A representative from each service will be at their station to introduce services, answer questions, and share contact information. The second round will feature providers focused on postpartum and community support. This process simulates two parallel experiences: families navigating services, and providers finding one another. Each participant will leave having made community connections and planting a seed for growth—specifically a personal contact form and brochures.

Event Venue & Nearby Stays

ilani, 1 Cowlitz Way, Ridgefield, United States