You never know how strong you are, until being strong is your only choice.
~Bob Marley
A Little Bit About Us
The New Life Foundation’s purpose is to address and educate the public about the needs of premature babies and sick newborns. We also coordinate and provide support to those seeking prevention, treatment and cure for debilitating medical conditions of premature babies and sick newborns.
We provide education through public venues as well as social media channels and the corporation’s website. These venues provide facts, statistics and other related data on causes, current efforts and solutions to aiding the medical needs of premature babies and sick newborns.
Our programs include holding fundraising events and various awareness campaigns through social media and other forms of public contact. We provide support to those in the development of preventions, treatments and cures of debilitating ailments of premature babies and sick newborns regardless of their race, ethnicity, or religion.
Neonatology
Neonatology is a sub-specialty of pediatrics that consists of the medical care of newborn infants, especially the ill or premature newborn infant. It is a hospital-based specialty, and is usually practiced in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs). The principal patients of neonatologists are newborn infants who are ill or requiring special medical care due to prematurity, low birth weight, intrauterine growth retardation, congenital malformations (birth defects), sepsis, pulmonary hyperplasia or birth asphyxias.
– Daniel Swartz
Founder
A Bit of History
While high infant mortality rates were recognized by the British medical community at least as early as the 1860s,[1] modern neonatal intensive care is a relatively recent advance. In 1898 Dr. Joseph DeLee established the first premature infant incubator station in Chicago, Illinois. The first American textbook on prematurity was publRather than focusing on a particular organ system, neonatologists focus on the care of newborns who require Intensive Care Unit (ICU) hospitalization. They may also act as general pediatricians, providing well newborn evaluation and care in the hospital where they are based. Some neonatologists, particularly those in academic settings, may follow infants for months or even years after hospital discharge to better assess the long-term effects of health problems early in life. Some neonatologists perform clinical and basic science research to further our understanding of this special population of patients.ished in 1922. In 1952 Dr. Virginia Apgar described the Apgar scorescoring system as a means of evaluating a newborn’s condition. It was not until 1965 that the first American newborn intensive care unit (NICU) was opened in New Haven, Connecticut and in 1975 the American Board of Pediatrics established sub-board certification for neonatology.[2]
Spectrum of Care
The 1950s brought a rapid escalation in neonatal services with the advent of mechanical ventilation of the newborn. This allowed for survival of smaller and smaller newborns. In the 1980s, the development of pulmonary surfactant replacement therapy further improved survival of extremely premature infants and decreased chronic lung disease, one of the complications of mechanical ventilation, among less severely premature infants. In 2006 newborns as small as 450 grams and as early as 22 weeks gestation have a chance of survival. In modern NICUs, infants weighing more than 1000 grams and born after 27 weeks gestation have an approximately 90% chance of survival and the majority have normal neurological development.[3]
Mission Statement
- The New Life Foundation Mission Statement:To provide education through public venues utilizing social media channels and the foundation’s web site to provide facts, statistics and other related data on causes, current efforts and solutions to aiding the medical needs of premature babies and sick newborns.
- To hold fundraising events and various awareness campaigns through social media, our foundation website, and other forms of public contact (Meet ‘n Greet, Foundation Gala).
- To provide funding through an application process to those who demonstrate the ability and means to pursue research in search of preventions, treatments and cures of debilitating ailments of premature babies and sick newborns regardless of their race , ethnicity or religion.
