Providing for the Premature Baby

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The medical community has made amazing advances in the last several decades in caring for premature babies. Many young adults today are living healthy and happy lives thanks to these advances. Despite these medical successes, premature babies continue to require special treatment while in the hospital as well as when they are brought home.

In the Hospital

  • Help with Breathing

While the premature baby’s external appearance clearly shows his underdevelopment, vital internal organs are also affected. Most premature babies have problems in breathing. Their neurological systems are not fully programmed. Breathing is not yet automatic, and sometimes simply stops. For this reason, premature babies are placed in isolation in ventilators, helping them to breathe until their lungs and neurological systems development can enable them to breathe successfully on their own. Some premature babies require many weeks in a ventilator until their bodies are capable of breathing reliably. [Read more...]

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Today is World Prematurity Day!

March of Dimes/World Prematurity Day
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Worldwide, 13 million babies are born preterm each year and one million of those die each year as a result of their early birth. Today (November 17th, 2011) is the first-ever World Prematurity Day, part of the March of Dime’s Prematurity Awareness Month, to honor these premature infants and raise awareness about the importance of striving to give every baby a healthy start in life.

So today, I not only praise the March of Dimes for helping my preemie twins, Macy and Mallory, survive almost eighteen years ago, but I also praise my preemie twins themselves for the fine young ladies they have turned out to be. Read our story.

Macy recently attended the FCCLA Cluster Meeting in Minneapolis and was so excited to tell me that one of the presentations at the convention was the March of Dimes talking about World Prematurity Day. I am hoping she decides to do a Star Project on being a preemie and share her miraculous story.

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Guest Post: Can a Wallaby Save Your Premature Baby’s Life?

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Wallaby

Premature babies—they’re fragile and need as much nutrition as possible, even more so than “regular babies” to gain the strength and energy they need to survive. While breast milk and formula milk are designed to give that proper nutrition, a premature baby’s underdeveloped gut makes it difficult to absorb proper nutrients from either milk substances. But according to Australian researchers, a different kind of milk may just be able to give premature babies the boost they need–wallaby milk.

That’s right, according to a team of researchers from Deakin University’s Institute for Technology in Melbourne, tamar wallabies (cousins to the Kangaroo) produce a milk contain special proteins that can actually help strengthen and repair a human premature baby’s gut, which ultimately means he or she will be able to obtain more nourishment.

[Read more...]

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