There's no place like home
Your donations have funded and grown the Stollery Neonatal Home Support Team (NHST) for the past five years, leading to significantly improved outcomes for pre-term infants and allowing them to stay where they thrive the best – at home with their families.
The NHST program was originally funded by the Foundation in 2019 as a pilot project when gaps in care were discovered after pre-term babies were discharged from Stollery Children’s Hospital neonatal intensive care units (NICUs). Before the NHST program, parents and caregivers often had to navigate the transition from the NICU to home and the subsequent months before their initial follow-up appointment on their own.
The pilot phase of the program focused on supporting babies born extremely prematurely who faced challenges with feeding, weight gain, development and were at higher risk for readmission to hospital. Follow-ups for the infants in the program were promising, resulting in lower readmission rates, better outcomes in babies neurodevelopment and enthusiastic feedback from caregivers. With these successes and further positive outcomes, the NHST team has been continuously expanded year over year with Foundation funding.
Over the past five years, the NHST program has grown to a team of five registered nurses serving patients seven days a week in the Edmonton area and beyond through in-person and virtual care.
The expansion of the team has not only led to better outcomes for pre-term infants but has also allowed for babies to be sent home from the Hospital earlier than was previously possible. More funding for staff has meant that the team can now support babies who require short-term feeding support, blood pressure monitoring, specialty skin or wound care as well as lab specimen sampling right in their homes.
As of this year, the NHST team has provided a new standard of care for 1,020 pre-term Stollery infants.
Foundation funding has also provided support to purchase equipment to implement a pilot project focused on providing phototherapy in the home for low-risk babies with jaundice.
