Report Card

The March of Dimes has graded states by comparing each state's rate of premature birth to the nation's objective of 7.6 percent or less. You can help them make progress for preemies by signing the petition and finding out more about what you can do.

Embrace

Save millions of babies with a single vote...

Embrace is a low-cost incubator designed to save premature babies in developing countries.

Please help us win $1.5 million from American Express.


Here's what YOU can do:


1) For American Express members (U.S. cardholders only): click on www.membersproject.com/project/view/AGAYRZ (or paste this link into your browser) and login to vote for Embrace (“$25 Infant Incubator”. There is NO donation required. American Express will donate $1.5 million to the project with the most votes. We believe we need 10,000 votes to win, meaning each vote could be worth $150!


2) Forward this email to your networks. Please send this to at least 5 - 15 people, including:
Friends and family
Your company and coworkers
Your alumni networks
If you forward this email to 15 or more people, you are eligible to enter a lottery for an all expense paid trip to visit Embrace in India. Visit www.embraceglobal.org/amexchallenge.html for details.
The deadline to vote is September 29th.

Thanks for your support!


About Embrace

Embrace is a startup nonprofit organization that aims to save 20 million low birth weight babies born every year through a low cost infant incubator. While traditional incubators up to $20,000, Embrace is an incubator that costs $25. The founders are a group of engineers, MBAs and public policy students from Stanford, Harvard and Kellogg. You can find out more about Embrace at www.embraceglobal.org

Preeclampsia

What is Preeclampsia?

Preeclampsia is a hypertensive disorder that occurs only during pregnancy and the postpartum period. The onset of preeclampsia usual takes place after 20 weeks gestation. Preeclampsia, Pregnancy Induced Hypertension (PIH) and toxemia are closely related conditions just as HELLP Syndrome and eclampsia are also manifestations of the same syndrome.
Preeclampsia causes blood pressure to rise increasing the risk of stroke or impaired kidney function, impaired liver function, blood clotting problems, pulmonary edema (fluid on the lungs), seizures, and in severe forms maternal and infant death.


What percentage of women experience Preeclampsia?

Preeclampsia occurs in 5%-8% of all pregnancies. Preeclampsia can appear at any time during a pregnancy, delivery and up to six weeks post-partum. HELLP Syndrome (hemolysis, elevated liver enzymes, and lowered platelets), one of the most severe forms of preeclampsia occurs in 4%-12% of the women who have preeclampsia.

What are some risk factors for developing Preeclampsia?

-Previous History of preeclampsia
-History of chronic high blood pressure, diabetes or kidney disorder
-Family history of preeclampsia
-Women with a greater than 30% Body Mass Index (BMI)
-Multiple gestation
-Over 40 or under 18 years of age
-Polycystic ovarian syndrome
-Lupus or other autoimmune disorders such as rheumatoid arthritis, sarcoidosis or MS

What causes Preeclampsia?

There is not just one known cause of preeclampsia, there are many theories as to what causes it. Some of the theories include insufficient blood flow to the uterus, calcium deficiency, preexisting maternal condition, nutritional problems and high body fat.

Preeclampsia and Prematurity.

Preeclampsia is responsible for 15% of premature births in the United States each year. It is the leading known cause of preterm birth.

Warning Signs and Symptoms

High Blood Pressure
Headache
Protein in your urine
Nausea or vomiting
Swelling of hands, feet and face
Changes in vision
Sudden weight gain


**FOR ADDITIONAL INFORMATION ON PREECLAMPSIA PLEASE VISIT THE PREECLAMPSIA FOUNDATION AT http://www.preeclampsia.org/

No-Cost Vision Screening for Infants: InfantSEE®

No-Cost Vision Screening for Infants: InfantSEE®
Adapted from www.infantsee.org by Diana McAlister

Public health experts agree that visual development is most dramatic between 6 and 12 months of age and that early detection can prevent and help reduce the threat of serious vision impairments. In fact, one in every 10 children is at risk from undiagnosed eye and vision problems. If left untreated, eye and vision problems can impact learning and may lead to permanent vision impairment.
InfantSEE® is a no-cost public health program designed to ensure that eye and vision care becomes an integral part of infant wellness care to improve a child's quality of life. This program was launched in 2005 by the American Optometric Association (AOA), in partnership with The Vision Care Institute of Johnson & Johnson Vision Care, Inc to provide professional eye care for infants nationwide.
Under this program, supported by former President Jimmy Carter, who serves as honorary national chair and spokesman, participating optometrists provide a one-time, comprehensive eye assessment to infants in their first year of life, offering detection of potential eye and vision problems at no cost regardless of income. Over 7000 optometrists participate in this program. To find one near you please visit www.infantsee.org.

First-of-a-Kind Technology to Help Doctors Care for Premature Babies

First-of-a-Kind Technology to Help Doctors Care for Premature Babies IBM and University of Ontario Institute of Technology Collaborate With Canadian Hospital to Help Predict Changes in Infants' Condition

ARMONK, NY and TORONTO - 23 Jul 2008: IBM (NYSE: IBM) and the University of Ontario Institute of Technology (UOIT) announced today a first-of-a-kind research project to help doctors detect subtle changes in the condition of critically ill premature babies.

The project will see a group of internationally recognized researchers, led by Dr. Carolyn McGregor, a UOIT associate professor and Canada Research Chair in Health Informatics, use advanced stream computing software developed by IBM Research to work toward greatly enhancing the decision-making capabilities of doctors. The software ingests a constant stream of biomedical data, such as heart rate and respiration, along with environmental data gathered from advanced sensors and more traditional monitoring equipment on and around the babies.

The researchers will also use the software to apply findings from Dr. McGregor's body of research to help make "sense" of the data and, in near-real-time, feed back the resulting analysis to health-care professionals so they can predict potential changes in an infant's condition with greater accuracy and intervene more quickly.

Physicians in neonatal intensive care units (NICU) at Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children and two other international hospitals are participating in the study.

Monitoring "preemies" as a patient group is especially important as certain life-threatening conditions such as infection can be detected up to 24 hours in advance by observing changes in physiological data streams.
The type of information that will come out of the research project is not available today. Currently, physicians monitoring preemies rely on a paper-based process that involves manually looking at the readings from various monitors and getting feedback from the nurses providing care.

"This research has the potential to reatly impact neonatal care through reduced mortality and morbidity rates and overall health-care costs," said Dr. McGregor. "By merging our research and technology, we are able to collect more detailed patient data in a systematic manner, do online health analysis and decision support, and get advanced early warning of emerging patterns that could predict a medical event."

When fully developed, IBM's software will be capable of processing the 512 readings per second generated by some of these medical devices, and UOIT researchers will further test and develop its ability to analyze these vast quantities of data in real time.

Initially researchers will use NICU medical devices in UOIT's state-of-the-art Health Informatics Laboratory to test IBM's software using simulated patient mirroring data. Then the software will be tested using de-identified actual patient data. The de-identified data is recorded in a way that enables researchers to alter some variables, play it back and run simulations for further study.

IBM awarded Dr. McGregor access to the prototype software patented by researchers at its T.J. Watson research facility in New York under its First-of-a-Kind program, which is designed to accelerate the delivery of innovative technologies to the market and link IBM's research work to real world problems.

"Right now, there is an enormous amount of critical data produced by machines monitoring patients," said Don Aldridge, business executive for IBM research and life science. "That creates a challenge. The ability to quickly analyze that data and make informed decisions will help improve the overall quality of health care."

http://www-03.ibm.com/press/us/en/pressrelease/24694.wss

Behavior Disorders in Preterm Children

A study in the September edition of “Pediatrics” found that children who are born very prematurely are at increased for attention problems, hyperactivity and social relationship problems. In “Pervasive Behavior Problems at 6 Years of Age in a Total-Population Sample of Children Born at < 25 Weeks of Gestation” researchers used reports filed by parents and teachers in the United Kingdom and Ireland to test whether extremely premature children have more behavior problems than classroom peers. They found that these children were four times more likely to have emotional problems or behavior disorders such as attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder at 6 years of age, compared to children born at full term. Extremely preterm girls had a higher degree of conduct behavior problems than other girls their age, and boys experienced more difficulties relating to peers. To access the study online, go to http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/

**Taken from HMHB Monday Morning Memo Message***

A Call To Parents

The Christopher Joseph Concha Foundation distributes a quarterly newsletter to various hospitals across the US. We are always looking for new topics that are relevant, informative and beneficial to parents and families of premature children. If you have an experience that you would like to share with our readers or have a topic you think preemie parents would be interested in, please let us know.

We have added a new section in our newsletter that features a graduate of the NICU. In this section parents write about their time in the NICU and life after. If you would like us to feature your story, please e-mail us.

Lastly, if you know of a hospital that may be interested in receiving our newsletter or a hospital that may benefit from our gift deliveries, again let us know.