Baby Talk May2019

BT Buzz
No wires,
more cuddles
An interdisciplinary
Northwestern University
team has developed
a pair of soft, flexible
wireless sensors that replace the
tangle of wire-based sensors that currently monitor
babies in hospitals’ neonatal intensive care units
(NICU) and pose a barrier to parent-baby cuddling
and physical bonding. The study, involving materials
scientists, engineers, dermatologists and pediatricians
will be published March 1 in the journal Science. The
study includes initial data from more than 20 babies
who wore the wireless sensors alongside traditional
monitoring systems, so Northwestern researchers
could do a side-by-side, quantitative comparison.
Since then, the team has conducted successful tests
with more than 70 babies in the NICU. “We know
that skin-to-skin contact is so important for newborns
-- especially those who are sick or premature,” said
Paller, a pediatric dermatologist at Lurie Children’s.
“It’s been shown to decrease the risk of pulmonary
complications, liver issues and infections. Yet, when
you have wires everywhere and the baby is tethered to
a bed, it’s really hard to make skin-to-skin contact.”
Early solid food for less risks
of allergies
New parents worry about a lot of things, but the
American Academy of Pediatrics says one thing they
can cross off that list is concern about giving highallergy
foods too early in life. In fact, the pediatric
group says it’s likely better to introduce foods like
peanut butter when kids are around 6 months of age.
“There’s no reason to restrict early introduction to
allergenic foods,” said a co-author of a new clinical
report from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP),
Dr. Frank Greer. He’s a professor emeritus of pediatrics
at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. Although
experts had advised parents in the past to avoid highly
allergenic foods early in life,
more recent research has
suggested that early exposure
to these foods might be a
better option. In addition to
freeing up parents to let their
youngsters try peanut butter
or ground peanut products at
an early age, the report also
said that moms don’t need to
restrict their diets during pregnancy and breastfeeding
to try to prevent allergies.
Sudoku
2 4 1 3
7 4
1 9 2 8 4 7
4 6 3 1 8 9
5
8 3 4 7 6 2
4 2 1 5 3 6
9 3
3 5 9 8
Solutions:
2 7 4 5 6 9 1 8 3
6 3 8 7 1 4 2 5 9
1 5 9 2 3 8 4 6 7
7 4 6 3 2 1 8 9 5
9 2 1 8 5 6 7 3 4
5 8 3 4 9 7 6 2 1
4 9 2 1 8 5 3 7 6
8 6 7 9 4 3 5 1 2
3 1 5 6 7 2 9 4 8
BabyTalk | May 2019 5