Today marks World Prematurity Awareness Day. This day is recognised to support and empower families affected by premature birth by advocating increased awareness, and post-natal education.
Globally, one in ten babies are born pre-term every year, three quarters could be saved with existing and cost effective interventions. Each year in Ireland, over 4.500 babies are born prematurely. Parents should have and be aware of the resources to assist them in becoming competent caregivers for their neonatal child. The Irish Neonatal Health Alliance is Ireland’s first collaborative platform to represent the interests of preterm infants, ill infants in the Neonatal Intensive Care Units AND their families.
We spoke to the founder of The Irish Neonatal Health Alliance, Mandy Daly, and she provided us with critical information on the challenges that pre-term babies face. She said, "a lot of people I think, think that the only thing pre-term babies need to do is gain weight and come home. Some of these pre-term babies find themselves in an incubator, surrounded by noise, by light, by touch, by smells, all of which their body is too immature to process, and they struggle with that. And That can be a huge source of stress for them".
Mandy then explained the work the INHA has done on the area of 'sensory environment', which educates staff and parents to help them to identify and mitigate their babies stress symptoms. Pre-mature babies are highly sensitive to touching and stroking, which can lead to parents finding it difficult to connect with, or embrace their child. Mandy shared what to do in this instance, ensuring parents that their role is still very much there. Parents are encouraged to 'Comfort Hold' their baby; which is a form of positive touch and helps your baby to feel secure and relaxed. It is
often used after a medical procedure. Before you start ensure that your hands are clean and warm. Start by offering a finger to your baby to hold, or by cupping your baby’s feet, body and head in your hand. This is a way for you to connect with your baby in a different, calmer way for your child.
Mandy also stressed the importance and effectiveness of skin-to skin care, she described it as the "most amazing intervention". Skin-to-skin care, or Kangaroo Care is defined as the “Early, prolonged & continuous skin-to-skin contact between a mother/father and their new-born". This act releases Oxytocin, the chemical messenger released in the brain chiefly in response to social contact, but its release is especially pronounced with skin-to-skin contact. In addition to providing health benefits, this hormone promotes bonding patterns and creates desire for further contact with the individuals". Mandy said how effective skin-to-skin care is, and that it has been extensively researched. She commented on the thousands of papers which demonstrate the benefits of skin to skin, which found "The babies are calmer, they grow faster, they've less infections, they get out of hospital a lot earlier". Mandy also emphasised how this act re-establishes parents of their parental role!
The relationship your baby has with you, their parent or primary carer, has an enormous impact on their future mental, physical, social, and emotional health. Mandy concluded by saying "from us, having been in this area for the last twenty-years, we have begun to realise that the fact that pre-term birth may not end at discharge requires a much greater investment by our governments, by our health systems globally, into the area of neonatology and paediatrics. By investing early, and ensuring that some of the health challenges that many of our children have these days; are reduced, mitigated, eradicated, actually saves the healthcare system money in the long term". Early investment in healthcare for pre-term care reaps huge awards for the child, but this does require investment from governments and health care systems.
