Prematurity…One word…Countless stories & emotions behind it. Joy, sadness, anxiety in general, anxiety for tomorrow, anticipation, guilt, mourning…Children who came out victorious, children flying in the skies, all the fighters. The bravest fighters. All of them have something to teach us and above all the will to live.

Let’s take the things from the beginning. Premature is any baby born before 37 weeks of pregnancy. Large (or late) preterm is 34-36 weeks, very preterm is 28-32 weeks, and extremely preterm is <28 weeks' gestation. Premature babies usually also have a low birth weight, i.e. they weigh less than 2.5 kg. In years 2023 a baby may be born at the beginning of 6u month of pregnancy (or the 22the week of gestation) with an extremely low birth weight of 500 grams or less and survive.

How common is prematurity?

About 1 in 10 children are born prematurely worldwide. In our country more than 8,000 babies are born prematurely every year, 1 every hour that passes.

But what is the cause of prematurity?

We know that twins, triplets, etc., are brought earlier by the “stork”, in addition, a mother’s infection or other conditions, such as high blood pressure or blood sugar, are causes of prematurity. Many times, however, we do not know what caused the premature birth.

How do we care for premature babies?

The smaller a premature newborn, the greater the needs and possibly the fluctuations in its journey. A neonatologist is a pediatrician with a heart big enough to hold all the tiny beating hearts in a Neonatal Unit. The neonatologist together with the specialized nursing staff take care of the newborns, so that they breathe calmly, until they manage to breathe on their own without any help. They wake up on their head when the belly swells. They take care of their diet so that they grow properly. They keep an eye on their most precious organ, the brain.

Where are parents in the prematurity journey?

I will tell you for sure, where they should NOT be, far from them!

The parents often stand at the edge of the incubator, meteoric, premature too, they didn’t expect it so early, they had imagined it completely differently. Pink or blue balloons next to the bed in the maternity hospital, return home in 2-3 days all together. Instead, new terms and images “forcefully” invade their daily lives. MENN (Munit Edative Nloyalty Nfertile), incubator, intubation, ventilator, feeding tube (SS. tube that is inserted through the nose or mouth and ends up in the newborn’s stomach, because the sucking-swallowing reflex has not yet matured enough to breastfeed or bottle feed), many machines, many beeps, many tubes and wires.

What should we do for parents as health professionals?

Let’s embrace them mentally and physically! This is what we do at MITERA in collaboration with the Institute for the promotion of Mental Health in Pregnancy and in the first years of Life, “KOTIDA”.

With the founder and Scientific Manager of Coitidas, the psychoanalyst Mrs. Meropi Michaleli, we created a psychological support and empowerment group for parents of premature babies hospitalized newborn, with the aim of helping parents emotionally manage prematurity, easing their stress and anxieties. The meetings are held every Tuesday 14:00 – 15:00, at the “N. Louros” by MITERA and participation is free.

The response from parents is great. So is the need. We hope that this pilot cooperation will solidify for good.

Kangaroo care: a parent’s hug is powerful therapy

But let’s get back to the hug. Hugging is healing. The parent’s hug, the parent’s skin-to-skin contact with the newborn is powerful therapy. This is also his slogan this year EFCNI (European Foundation for the Care of Newborn Infant) (SS. That EFCNI is an organization, a network of health professionals and parents representing the interests of premature babies and their families).

Skin-to-skin contact or kangaroo care, which provides warmth to the baby (literally!), the best thermoregulation is not done by an incubator, but by the parent’s embrace. Other important benefits are better infant sleep, better weight gain, higher breastfeeding rates and “bonding” between infant and family.

As dad Stavros told us at one point, “I felt like a father when I hugged Philip for the first time”. That’s kangaroo care in one sentence.

Instead of an epilogue, I would like to close with the words of a mother of premature twins Raif and his Harrisonaddressing us, the health professionals who are the quintessence of Neonatology: “Help us help them become the ‘best’ children they can be, empowering us to be the best parents we can be from day one.”