November is National Prematurity Awareness Month. According to the CDC, about 1 in 10 babies are born preterm, or before completing the normal 37 to 40 weeks of pregnancy- this is about 400,000 babies born preterm each year in the United States. On this fascinating episode of the Baby Steps Nutrition Podcast, Argavan speaks with Dr. Melinda Elliott, a Board-Certified neonatologist and researcher in neonatal intensive care, who has committed her 30+-year career to the care of vulnerable, premature infants and published groundbreaking research on the benefits of an exclusive human milk diet for premature infants in the NICU. She is also Chief Medical Officer for Prolacta Bioscience. Argavan and Dr. Elliott discuss the role that nutrition plays in a premature baby born low weight or extremely low weight, the medical challenges that babies in the NICU face and how best to support caregivers to ensure optimal care, helpful resources for families in the first year or two after discharge and much more! You don’t want to miss this one!
Mentioned in this Episode:
Resources for Parents- Prolacta Bioscience
Parent Support Groups for Babies in the NICU and after discharge
Parent Associations
Study: An overview of adult health outcomes after preterm birth; Early Hum Dev. 2020 Nov; 150: 105187
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7480736/
For more on Dr. Elliott, you can follow her on LinkedIn @MelindaElliott and through the website https://www.prolacta.com/en/.
For more on Argavan Nilforoush, be sure to follow her on Instagram @babystepsnutrition, on Facebook: Baby Steps Nutrition page, on YouTube: Baby Steps Nutrition Podcast, on Twitter @argavanRDN, on LinkedIn @ArgavanNilforoush and through her website www.babystepsnutrition.com.