Former NICU parents at Saint Barnabas Medical Center (SBMC) often say how helpless they felt at times while their baby was in the NICU. The nurses at SBMC have been focusing in recent years on encouraging and supporting parents to hold their babies and be involved in their care whenever possible, to try to cut down on this feeling some. Also in the last few years, research has shown that reading out loud to sick and premature babies brings extra special benefits to the babies as well as their parents.
For NICU parents, reading out loud to baby is a way to be involved with them in a positive way that is not medical but rather a “normal” thing a parent would do with a baby. Often, reading this way to babies in the NICU helps parents bond and feel a little bit “closer” to their baby. It’s also something the parents can do for their baby at a time when they may feel as if there might not be much more they can to do in the NICU.
Very important research also shows that babies in the NICU have important brain development going on and reading to these babies helps aid in this development. Believe or not, it seems it is helpful to both speak to your baby AND read out loud to them. Neonatologists at a NICU in Boston found it so important that they set a goal for parents, or other family members, to read to their NICU baby at least once every day. Research also shows that from birth and beyond, in addition to advancing brain development, language skills, and vocabulary, reading out loud can also build listening and memory skills over time.
So, bring a few books to the NICU and try to read to your baby each day. You will be glad you did! If you want to read out loud to your baby in your native language, please do so. Later this fall, graduate NICU parents will try to help ensure that all parents receive a board book to read to their baby as part of a new welcome bag. Until then, here are some good books you can get that they liked to read to their babies in the NICU:
1. Goodnight Moon
2. The Very Hungry Caterpillar
3. Guess How much I love You?
4. Five Little Monkeys
5. Llama Llama Nighty-Night
6. Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What do you see?
7. Where is Spot?
8. Jamberry
9. Good Night Gorilla
10. Moo, Baa, La, La, La!
11. The Colors of Us
12. If You Give a Mouse a Cookie
Visit our website for more NICU family education and information.