Hospital implements shaken baby prevention program

Published 12:00 am Wednesday, December 2, 2009

Rowan Regional Medical Center has become one of the first hospitals in the region to implement a new shaken baby prevention program.
Maternity nurses at the hospital now provide program materials and information to parents of newborns at the hospital before they are discharged.
The program began Nov. 1.
Michael Burton, director of public relations and marketing, said the program is based on a statewide initiative, Keeping Babies Safe in North Carolina.
“While it is voluntary, we thought it was important to participate and educate new parents about the importance of preventing shaken baby syndrome,” Burton said.
Nationally, an estimated 1,200 to 1,400 children each year receive medical treatment after being shaken. About 25 percent of these children die, and 80 percent of survivors are left with some form of life-long brain injury.
At Rowan Regional, each new mother will receive a DVD called “The Period of Purple Crying,” and the maternity staff of the Women’s and Children’s Center will provide educational sessions while they are patients at the hospital.
The program educates parents and caregivers about the hazards of shaking and gives them alternatives to use when they feel they need a respite from a crying baby, such as handing a baby off to another caregiver or going to another room while leaving the baby in its crib with the rails up for periods of no longer than 15 minutes.
“The main objective of the program is to bring about a cultural change in the community concerning the understanding of crying and shaken baby syndrome,” said Cora Greene, director of women’s and children’s services at Rowan Regional. “This is so that not only mothers and fathers of new babies, but also friends, family, neighbors and health-care professionals can be supportive of parents and more knowledgeable about the characteristics of infant crying.”
Training and supplies for the program were made available by Keeping Babies Safe in North Carolina, collaboration between the National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome, the University of North Carolina Injury Prevention Research Center and the Center for Child and Family Health.
Keeping Babies Safe in North Carolina hopes to reduce Shaken Baby Syndrome in North Carolina by 50 percent over the next five years. This represents the largest and most comprehensive intervention for shaken baby syndrome in the country.The first step in the process is for all 90 hospitals in the state that handle deliveries to share the materials and message with all parents and caregivers of infants. This way, the program will reach every parent of the approximately 125,000 babies born in the state each year.
Keeping Babies Safe in North Carolina has received more than $7 million from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Duke Endowment. It is led by a broad coalition of stakeholders from the National Center for Shaken Baby Syndrome, University of British Columbia, state and county agencies, service providers and nonprofit agencies.
More help is available by calling the N.C. Family Resource Health Line at 1-800-367-2229, or by visiting the Web site for the National Center on Shaken Baby Syndrome at www.dontshake.org.