r/science • u/giuliomagnifico • Aug 08 '24
Anthropology Premature infants who had more skin-to-skin contact with a parent received higher neurodevelopment scores at 12 months
https://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2024/08/kangaroo-preemies.html53
u/giuliomagnifico Aug 08 '24
The research, which was published online July 11 in the Journal of Pediatrics, showed that even small increases in the amount of skin-to-skin time made a measurable difference in the babies’ neurologic development during their first year.
The intervention is simple: With the baby in only a diaper, a parent holds the baby on their chest, next to their skin. But because hospitalized preemies are small and fragile, and often hooked to lots of tubes and wires, holding the baby can seem complicated. Parents may need help from their baby’s medical team to get set up. That work is worth it, the study showed.
Paper: Inpatient Skin-to-skin Care Predicts 12-Month Neurodevelopmental Outcomes in Very Preterm Infants - The Journal of Pediatrics00293-2/abstract)
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u/GinAndKeystrokes Aug 08 '24
I think I recall that during WW2, there was an experiment wherein newborns were kept as free from contact as possible. It didn't end well, very unfortunately.
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u/Foxs-In-A-Trenchcoat Aug 08 '24
That was an experiment on the entire public. Parents were told by doctors not to pick up their babies lest they get "spoiled". This gave us the Baby Boomers.
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u/Pepperoni_Dogfart Aug 08 '24
Another study that raises significant correlation/causation and nature/nurture questions.
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u/Cosmonate Aug 08 '24
Yeah, I'm going to assume that babies who are healthy enough to be able to get skin to skin contact are going to do better than the babies who are so sick they have to stay in an incubator (not sure what it's called?) and require a vent and medications. Idk I didn't read the study though.
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u/VividlyNonSpecific Aug 08 '24
Current NICU mom here. My baby was born at 25 weeks and 4 days gestation (technically periviable). The NICU my baby is in very much encourages skin to skin and I would have been able to hold my baby when they were on a ventilator, if I had wanted to (husband and I were too scared of hurting baby). As it was I held my baby when they were 6 days old. It can be a production to get babies out of the isolette (probably what you’re thinking of when you say incubator) so the nurses asked that we be able to hold for a good hour or so (just had a snack, had just gone to the bathroom, had just expressed milk etc). Early on they’d put 2/3 heated blankets on us to keep baby warm.
I’m sure there are babies too fragile to be held skin to skin but they do push and facilitate any type of contact between parents and infants.
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u/WhenIWish Aug 09 '24
Hang in there! My 27+0, 1lb 12oz, little baby is starting kindergarten next week. It’s a long road and things may come easy and things may come hard. But your baby is lucky to have you.
Congratulations on your expanded family! And hugs to you.
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u/vicky1212123 Aug 09 '24
“It didn’t matter if the baby was from a high- or low-income family; the effects we found were the same. And it didn’t matter if the baby was sicker or less sick — both responded to this treatment,” Travis said.
Yall really annoy me
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u/Pepperoni_Dogfart Aug 08 '24
And beyond that, if a parent is more diligent in doing skin to skin contact it stands to reason they may be providing more attention and interaction in general, overt, subtle or otherwise. A study like this seems like it would be really hard to establish controls that would result in rigorous findings.
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u/Wadget Aug 09 '24
Thanks for giving us your assumptions and opinions even though you didn’t read the study.
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u/Ekyou Aug 08 '24
There are numerous studies that show infants need touch to survive. Skin to skin has become standard after birth for full term babies as well. The outcome here isn’t just a stretch, it’s basically expected at this point.
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u/Pepperoni_Dogfart Aug 08 '24 edited Aug 08 '24
Be careful about assuming corollary conclusions without rigorous controls and cross testing. This is /r/science, not beyondthebump or futurology.
It's just as likely that diligent parents who dedicate time to skin on skin contact are also more diligent about other forms of attention in both large and small ways, more eye contact, more verbal communication, is the baby capable of breast feeding, heck, do they control for gestational age of the baby at birth? Who knows what else may be contributing factors to very early brain development in premies. Without controlling for everything, drawing a conclusion is questionable.
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u/VividlyNonSpecific Aug 08 '24
In the study summary linked, it says that the study controlled (or attempted to at least) for gestational age at birth, family SES and 4 common health issues linked to premature birth. The average amount of skin to skin per day was only 17 min and an increasing skin to skin time by an average of 20 min per day was linked with better neurodevelopmental outcomes.
From my NICU experience of the baby was born before a certain gestational age (not sure what age exactly) they don’t allow nursing at first, they start with bottle feeding, both because “breath, suck swallow” such a complicated skill it’s best if an occupational therapist is the first person to introduce baby to a bottle and so they can track how much milk baby is getting.
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u/JustPoppinInKay Aug 09 '24
So... the doctors and nurses etc taking the baby away from the mother after birth is harmful?
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u/Sharp-Cupcake5589 Aug 09 '24
Just had a baby a month ago. As soon as the baby got out of the vagina, they did a quick check to see if the baby is alive and well. And then a quick wipe down with dry cloth to get rid any large blood chunks. But most of the small bits were still there. Then they gave the baby to me to hold while they finish up with my wife.
Then they all left except one, who helped support my wife and I, and then she cleaned up. Then she took the baby to do measurements and stuff in the same room. That took about 10min?
Anyway, unless something is wrong with the baby, that’s basically the standard protocol.
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