Supporting Hospitals to Improve the Lives of Miracle Families
THURSDAY, JANUARY 21, 2021
Miracle Babies Foundation has a long and proud history of supporting the Australian neonatal community, improving the lives of premature and sick newborns, their families and the hospitals that care for them.
It all started from our humble beginnings; when a group of NICU mothers from the Liverpool region managed to raise over $1 million over four years for programs and services supporting premature and sick newborns and their families.
As a national organisation, we are committed to providing support for equipment, resources, education, research and programs. Australian hospitals are eligible to apply for small pieces of equipment and items that improve the NICU/SCN journey for families via our Support for Hospitals section of the website.
Throughout 2020 we provided items like fuel cards for parents living out of area and struggling to go to and from the hospital each day to visit their baby and provide breast milk.These are parents who must drive a long distance with babies not ready to be transferred back to their local hospital. Round trips cost a lot of money and many parents would not be able to vist without the fuel cards. There are also many other reasons these fuel cards are seen as essential to some parents; they may be struggling financially, be relying on friends or family to drive them and need to contribute to fuel costs, are long stay patients with babies born very early, are single parents, or may even be suffering from domestic violence or other hardships.
We also help families access breast pumps to take home so they may pump milk for their babies while still in the hospital.
Northern Territory Midwife, Donna Johnson said, “Bianca had baby Chase at 35 weeks. While he was in the Special Care Nursery at Royal Darwin Hospital until he was big enough to go home and breastfeed, Bianca used one of the "PINK PUMPS" to express breastmilk for baby Chase. She used the pump when she went home and brought the milk in the next day.
Thanks to Miracle Babies, SCN now has 15 Spectra S2 double pumps and expressing kits to loan (at no charge) to mothers while their baby is in SCN. This helps mums establish lactation and have expressed breast milk available for nasogastric feeds. When the baby is big enough to breast feed, mum’s milk is ready and waiting. Hiring or buying a pump can be very expensive, especially when you are expressing for a couple of months. Now we have the loan "Pink Pumps" available, this is one less worry for our SCN mums; knowing they can take a double pump home and use it until baby is ready to be discharged. Thankyou Miracle Babies and Inger Rice.”
Recent support to hospitals we've helped provide:
Jan 2020 – we provided 50 fuel cards to Fiona Stanley Hospital to help parents travelling to and from the hospital to visit and provide breastmilk for their child.
“I was struggling financially to get to hospital to see my baby. The fuel cards took a lot of pressure off my shoulders and I was able to visit my baby everyday”. Miracle Mum, R.W. a single mother of two whose baby was born at 30+1 weeks.
“I wouldn't be able to come and see my baby everyday without the fuel cards. I have no car, baby arrived earlier at 34 weeks. I had to bring my breast milk in everyday. I had to rely on my friend to drive me to hospital because the father of the baby lives in a separate house”. Miracle Mum, C.C.
Feb 2020 – we provided 50 fuel cards to Orange Hospital to help parents travelling to and from the hospital to visit and provide breastmilk for their child.
Feb 2020 – we purchased a SELPHY photo printer for Gold Coast University Hospital.
Staff from Gold Coast Unversity Hospital said, “As you know many of our patients are with us long term. This is upsetting to the parents and the families. Having regular photos of their baby’s growth and development helps the parents and their families. Many of these families do work and are unable to get in daily. Some of the families live overseas and in other areas of our country. These photos help the parents with dealing with the changes and different needs for the care we give their loved ones. With the photos they can watch their growth and development. These also can be used as a keep sake of the time they have spent watching their babies grow and develop while in our care.”
March/April 2020 – thanks to the Inger Rice Foundation, we provided 80 fuel cards to help parents travelling to and from Darwin Hospital to visit and provide breastmilk for their child. The same grant (Inger Rice) also provided 15 breast pumps and expressing equipment to Darwin Hospital for lending to parents.
August 2020 – we sent three Tommee Tippee donated electric breast pumps to Gold Coast University Hospital. The pumps are for mums who have been transferred from northern NSW and are required to be in hotel quarantine for 14 days. They have limited access to the hospital and no access to electric breast pumps. These pumps are important for mothers to be able to adequately express and provide breast milk for their babies, despite the stress of quarantine and limited ability to be at their baby’s bedside.
November 2020 – thanks to Variety WA, we sent four kangaroo care chairs to four WA hospitals (Joondalup, Perth Children’s, King Edward Memorial and Fiona Stanley).
