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In December, over 60 participants from eleven Latin American and Caribbean countries and the United States gathered in Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic to learn and share their experiences in Kangaroo Mother Care (KMC), a highly effective, low-cost intervention for premature and low-birth weight babies. KMC reduces newborn mortality by simulating the warm environment of a “human incubator” through skin-to-skin contacts and promotes breastfeeding, which helps these babies gain critical weight. The meeting was led by the USAID Maternal and Child Health Integrated Program (MCHIP) with support from USAID and the USAID Health Care Improvement Project (HCI). Doctors, nurses, MCHIP and HCI project advisors, and Ministry of Health and USAID officials exchanged valuable information on the design, implementation and evaluation of KMC programs.

Though some of these countries have had active KMC programs for many years, this meeting was the first opportunity for many of these doctors and nurses to talk with and learn from their counterparts in other countries. As these programs begin to grow and expand to new hospitals and communities, learning about others’ experiences and lessons learned can be invaluable. To continue this important dialogue, HCI is leading the development of a regional community of practice for Spanish speaking KMC program implementers. At the meeting, my colleague Jorge Hermida and I led a discussion on communities of practice, describing how a virtual community can be developed and support members. We then had a fascinating exchange where all participants identified what topics they wanted to learn more about as well as what they could share with others. Many of the participants were excited to realize that even though their project might be young, they still had valuable information to share with other countries.

The online component of the community will be hosted on HCI’s Spanish-language maternal and child health knowledge portal, http://www.maternoinfantil.org. The community will feature news, research, clinical tools, “ask-the-expert,” and discussion forums for users. Meeting participants were especially interested in continuing the conversation about a standardized set of program indicators and said they hoped to use the forum to offer each other support and advice as they continue their great work in KMC. The Kangaroo Foundation of Bogota, Colombia, will also launch a new website with support from the Colombian Ministry of Health and MCHIP, which will feature news and resources for KMC program implementers. These two online efforts will be linked and mutually reinforcing. We are excited to share the developments with the two sites with the Healthy Newborn Network.

Learn more about Kangaroo Mother Care:

• Read more about the meeting held last December
• Read about HCI’s experience implementing KMC programs in five Latin American countries (pdf)

Contact me for more information on the KMC community of practice.

The following was written by Gary Darmstadt and Wolfgang Munar, originally posted on Impatient Optimists.

In the late 1970s, when Wolfgang Munar, senior program officer for Family Health here at the foundation was a medical student in his native Colombia in the late 70s, he learned of a very simple method to save premature newborns. The method had been developed by two Colombian pediatricians, Edgar Rey and Hector Martinez, and was simply called Kangaroo Mother Care. Now, more than 30 years later, Wolfgang is helping to spread the word about how important kangaroo care is in helping to save the lives of newborns – especially in the poorest countries in the world.

Deceptively simple, Rey and Martinez described their approach as based on some of the oldest known human practices and behaviors: the provision of maternal warmth, love, and breast milk. Years later, study after study has demonstrated that this approach is effective in promoting breastfeeding, reducing neonatal infection, and significantly improving the odds of survival.

A recent review reported that kangaroo care cuts the risk of mortality of preterm infants in developing countries in half. The caveat in the original approach –and a feature that remains unchanged in Colombia to this day- was that kangaroo care was to be provided under medical supervision and within specialized hospital settings.

More than 30 years later, however, this highly effective, live-saving practice is practiced in many parts of the world and has been adapted to non-institutional settings where resources are scarce.

This year the Carlos Slim Health Institute, in Mexico, has chosen Colombia’s Kangaroo Foundation to be the recipient of the 2012 Carlos Slim Award as Exceptional Health Institution. The Jury, of which Wolfgang is a member, recognized the innovative and easily replicable nature of the Kangaroo Mother Care and its potential for saving the lives of millions of newborns around the world.

Coverage of this highly cost effective intervention remains unacceptably low, however, in light of the tremendous potential for impact if it were widely adopted. It is our hope that this award will stimulate policy makers and health care professionals around the world to champion its adoption in health care facilities.

Moreover, Gary Darmstadt, director of Family Health here at the foundation, has witnessed mothers providing this care to their newborns, and has seen the tremendous benefits it provides to newborns and their mothers in community settings. Its safety, simplicity and effectiveness suggest that this intervention ought to be extended to all infants – preterm and term - regardless of place of birth, the world over.