Keeping fragile babies warm and safe

07/01/2024

A generous and heartfelt gift given annually by The Norton Foundation provides for the purchase of a new Giraffe Infant Warmer Bed for our littlest patients at Banner Thunderbird Medical Center. The special bed makes transporting, monitoring, warming, weighing, taking X-rays, and positioning safer for these fragile babies.

The bed’s technology is designed to meet the ever-changing needs of Neonatal Intensive Care Unit babies, including controlled thermal environments, maintained warmth during transportation throughout the hospital, and improved visibility and access to the baby. Further, this unit helps mitigate excessive sounds for the baby, allowing for healthy growth and development throughout their hospital stay.

The entire NICU staff at Banner Thunderbird is trained and equipped to utilize these beds, also known as isolettes. In May 2023, Banner Thunderbird’s NICU saw 35 babies born at 23 to 26 weeks gestation, equal to the total number born at this early stage of development in all of 2022. This highlights the growing need for more NICU bed space as all Banner hospitals have seen an increase in the number of NICU beds occupied each year