Sue Moses is known to many as the ‘baby whisperer’ because of the way she is able to calm babies. When walking into a hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit, you’ll hear the beeps and whirring of machines. But there’s also a comforting presence found in a rocking chair. For over 24 years, Sue Moses has been volunteering her free time to rock and cuddle tiny babies and support the care teams at the Stanford Medicine Children’s Health (Level II) Intermediate Special Care Nursery (SCN) Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at Dignity Health Sequoia Hospital. The SCN is where you will find preemie ..read more

Findings back up a long-standing reading program in the Stanford Children’s NICU A newly published study from a team of researchers and physician-scientists at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health adds to the growing body of literature linking speech exposure in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) to positive health outcomes. The study set out to examine the relationship between the NICU speech environment and the rate of weight gain in premature infants while they were hospitalized. At Stanford Children’s, neonatologists, including the paper’s co-author Melissa Scala, MD, are also facul ..read more

National Prematurity Awareness Month has a special meaning for two 24-year-olds In the United States, at least one in 10 babies is born preterm, or at less than 37 weeks. With prematurity comes a host of possible immediate health complications, and babies may have long-term developmental challenges, too—especially if they are born extremely early. National Prematurity Awareness Month is honored every November to shed light on the needs of premature babies and their families and to raise awareness of the importance of quality medical care for these preemies. It’s a month that means a lot to 2 ..read more

Inside the spook-tacular celebration at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Doctors, nurses, therapists, hospital staff and volunteers at Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford all went the extra mile to give patients the ‘BOOst’ they need to feel better this Halloween. Young patients and hospital staff who were dressed as Barbie, Super Mario, princesses, superheroes and even Pokémon characters took to Stanford Children’s Annual Trick-or-Treat Trail. The Halloween event allows kids undergoing medical care to dress up and experience the fun holiday even while in the hospital. The hospital ..read more

Compassionate in-depth fetal counseling helps family make the best decision for them When Emily Van became pregnant with her third child, she expected an easy time. After all, she had had smooth courses with her first two sons, who were born healthy at 37 and 38 weeks. Yet, after five weeks of pregnancy, she realized something was off. “My body felt different, and I know my body well,” says Emily. “I started bleeding at five weeks, and I knew something was wrong.” The little voice that kept insisting that something was amiss, despite hearing that all was well, continued to play in her head ..read more

Nearly 800 children and their families met up for the 38th NICU/ICN grad party at Packard Children’s to reunite with the caregivers who saved them. Over the last five years, Lucile Packard Children’s Hospital Stanford has provided care for more than 6,500 babies in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) and intermediary care nursery (ICN). At this year’s NICU/ICN graduation party, former patients and their families had the heartwarming opportunity to reconnect with their dedicated care teams—nurses, neonatologists, social workers, respiratory therapists, occupational therapists, and child l ..read more

Meet the smallest baby to have been treated by our Preterm PDA Closure Program team Twenty-one-month-old Theia Dudorova toddles around her house, proud that she’s just discovered how to walk. She’s got eight teeth, with one more on the way, and loves to show them off with constant giggles and smiles. Her mother, Anastasiia Tarasova, is only too happy to try to keep up with her. She counts her blessings that Theia is healthy, having had her extremely prematurely—between 22 and 23 weeks’ gestation, and weighing 500 grams, or a little over a pound. Just a week after Theia was born, she experien ..read more

Stanford Medicine Children’s Health is the first-in-nation to offer a treatment for small jaw other than surgery When Brittany and Ben Proulx started planning their family, they both had one big worry – passing on Stickler syndrome, a genetic condition, to their kids. Stickler comes with a distinctive receding chin that can interfere with normal breathing and feeding, collectively called Pierre Robin sequence. “It was always the first concern to pop in our minds. Our anxieties were realized when our second baby was born with Stickler syndrome, unable to breath on her own,” says Brittany Proul ..read more

Seeking BPD care 700 miles away at Stanford Medicine Children’s Health pays off If expectant parents Owen and Jamie Brennan had to guess who they’d be most closely in touch with soon after their baby was born, they wouldn’t have guessed a stranger who lived almost 700 miles away. And they would never have imagined the situation they’d be in, that would involve calling, texting, and meeting about their daughter’s care with this person, “hundreds, or maybe thousands of times,” according to Owen. The stranger was Amanda Moy, NP, nurse coordinator in the Cardiac and Respiratory Care for Infants ..read more

A rare genetic condition meant a lot of uncertainty for an unborn baby. A multispecialty Stanford Medicine Children’s Health team came together to find answers. Alyssa and Justin Prettyman decided to have their third child a few years after moving to California from Boston in 2017. Having given birth to her first two children in major East Coast hospitals, Alyssa was looking forward to a quiet, natural birthing experience with local midwives. But her expectations took a sharp turn when she was five months along and an ultrasound revealed that her baby, Nya, had a heart condition. Alyssa was ..read more