Anyone who reads Edspire will know that Esther and William now 23 months were born at just 27 weeks gestation after I fell ill during my pregnancy. They were born at the William Harvey Hospital, Ashford, Kent. Where for 59 days they received excellent care.

Our Small Wonders

I truly believe that our small wonders had the best beginning they could hope for given their starting circumstances.

We will never be able to thank the NICU and SCBU staff enough for all they did for Esther and William, and for us.

The journey through NICU can be a long and lonely one. It is definitely a frightening one for all concerned. It is with great spirit and strength that my dear friend, Ruth, begins that journey, not for the first time, with her beautiful new daughter, born at just 25 weeks. My heart goes out to brand new Martha Mae Grace and my prayers are for her this day.

Dealing with premature labour (not everyone gets to take their baby home) and premature birth is a subject that is dear to my heart. It is something I have written about many times before. My own premature babies are the very reason I started this blog. They and their new sister are my beating heart and soul. And though life is tough, really tough some days, I thank God for every single moment as I know things could have turned out so differently.

I feel for every person who walks the NICU path and I was so pleased when I was invited to the launch of the Small Wonders DVD from Best Beginnings and I was so very sad that I could not go. But I still feel more than qualified to help with this campaign as though I did not attend the launch and here the stories of those families on the DVD, I have told a very similar tale of my own.

Best Beginnings: Small Wonders

The 19th June 2012 was the launch date of a new national initiative to enable every family of a sick or premature baby to be at the cornerstone of their baby’s care in ways that can help to improve health outcomes.

UK-based child health charity Best Beginnings, working with six medical Royal College, UNICEF and more than 15 other organisations, is rolling out a national Small Wonders Change Programme implemented by over 400 nurse, doctor and midwife ‘Champions’ within hospitals throughout the UK to help families of premature and sick babies in the UK irrespective of their socio-economic group, receive the same high quality family-centered care.

At the centre of the programme is the Small Wonders DVD, which is the culmination of two years of intensive work for Best Beginnings and follows fourteen families, charting the real-life experiences the parents faced as they met, cared for, and returned home with their premature or sick baby. With 80,000 babies in the UK each year born either premature or sick it is designed as a tool to enable neonatal staff to support and advise parents through their baby’s stay, and encourage parents to play a pivotal role in the care their baby receives in ways that have been proven to positively impact health outcomes, interventions and activities such expressing breast milk, responding to their baby’s non-verbal cues and having skin-to-skin contact.

Using the expertise of over 200 experts in neonatal care including consultant neonatologists, representatives of Royal Colleges, specialist dieticians and infant feeding specialists and created in conjunction with 10 hospitals across the UK, the Small Wonders DVD is designed to ensure that parents have the insight, guidance, confidence and support they need, from when they are first told they may be having a premature baby, through those first crucial hours after birth to their baby’s first birthday. The DVD is split into 12 films each covering a different topic, which parents can select individually
depending on the support they need. Films include “First hours”, “Expressing breast milk”, “Holding your baby”. An information booklet is also included with the DVD in which parents can record their thoughts and feelings as well as their own baby’s progress.

As part of this work, Best Beginnings has created a unique network of over 400 neo-natal nurses, midwives, doctors and allied healthcare professionals who have become “Small Wonders Champions, across the UK. The Small Wonders Champions are working, often in multi-disciplinary teams, to ensure that the Small Wonders DVD is used effectively and is available to all parents in their hospital faced with the prospect – or unexpected arrival – of a premature or sick baby. In the last six weeks, Best Beginnings has sent out more 65,000 free DVDs to hospitals across the UK. Many of these hospitals have begun giving the DVD to parents from today, with other hospitals planning to begin distribution to parents in the next few weeks, once all staff has seen the DVD and a clear distribution plan is in place. Over the last year, Best Beginnings has been actively supporting its Small Wonders Champions to become “catalysts for change” in their hospitals and help them ensure that the DVD will be effectively implemented and available to all parents. In addition to being available for free in neonatal units across the UK the Small Wonders DVD is available to purchase for £5 from www.bestbeginnings.org.uk/pages/shop/.

The DVD itself was made with the support of over 100 families who provided feedback at key stages in the production process, as well as the expert opinion and advice from over 100 health professionals from across the UK including consultant neonatologists and representatives from six medical Royal Colleges.

Best Beginnings is a small charity committed to having a big impact on child health across the UK. You can find out more about their work and support them at http://www.bestbeginnings.org.uk/appeal/donate-for-child-health.

“Professor Cathy Warwick CBE, General Secretary, Royal College of Midwives says; “I am delighted that the Royal College of Midwives has been a stakeholder on the Small Wonders DVD since the project got underway in 2010. It was so important that this DVD was made, as it will significantly contribute to supporting parents with premature babies at what could is often a very turbulent time for them. Once again Best Beginnings have created a powerful resource that will make a real difference to the lives of the families across the UK. ”

Alison Baum, Founder and CEO of Best Beginnings says “The launch of this DVD marks the culmination of six years of planning and two years of intensive work and collaboration. We set about making this DVD not only because of the strong evidence for the need but also because on a personal note, it is the DVD I would have wanted when my own sons faced their own challenges in infancy and my youngest developed meningitis at just eight days old. Our research told us that parents of premature or sick babies feel understandably overwhelmed by their experience. When their baby is so vulnerable they can feel that only the medical staff are able to provide the care they need, when in fact they themselves can have a vital role to play.”

Small Wonders case study and mum of twins born at 28 weeks, Sinem, says: “I really believe this DVD will make a difference to people’s lives at a time when you feel so lonely, you feel so isolated… it will empower people and make that start as easy as possible in what is a really, really difficult time.”

I have not seen the DVD, I wish I had so that I could comment more but I know that a film would have been helpful for me at the time. There was so much to learn and understand so quickly. So many whys, what ifs and maybes. Everyday would bring new questions, not always with answers.

I turned to the Internet and blogging during my NICU journey. It is how I first found Kylie at Not Even A Bag of Sugar.

It is a lonely time and so few people truly understand what you are going through each and every hour of each and every day. It would be nice to have this support and to know you are not on your own.

Well done Best Beginnings and thank heavens for Small Wonders.

I will be praying for all premature babies and their families tonight.

One of my wonders

The Wonders of My World