Camagüey, March 8.- In the province of Camagüey, the Ana Betancourt de Mora Provincial Maternal Hospital has a multidisciplinary team that applies the Kangaroo program with rigor and professionalism.
Among the specialists who participate are psychologists, social workers, neurologists, cardiologists and imaging specialists, who provide comprehensive care to mothers and their children.
This method in the Neonatology Service is an initiative that seeks to improve the health and development of premature and low birth weight babies, through skin-to-skin contact with their mothers.
This practice promotes exclusive breastfeeding, emotional bonding and thermal regulation of newborns.
Doctor Adrianky Pacheco, head of the service at the aforementioned hospital facility, explained that the main objective is to house pre-term children, with very low birth weight, next to the mother, on her lap, for as long as possible, until that reach at least 1,800 grams.
However, he clarified that there is no planned weight, but rather each case is evaluated individually.
Some of the mothers who benefit from the Kangaroo program expressed their satisfaction and gratitude for this experience.
Marian Guerra Moragues said that her daughter Ainoa Victoria was born prematurely and was separated from her for 21 days. After incorporating her, she was able to observe how her daughter gained weight and grew stronger every day.
It is incredible how the girl, being very close to you, increases gram by gram every day and you feel great satisfaction when you see that goals are being overcome and the change, the transformation at your side as a mother, she said.
Melani Hernández, another young mother of a girl born at 31 weeks, also valued the effectiveness of the Kangaroo program in allowing weight gain and the well-being of the infants who remain next to their mother and receive the much-needed warmth.
The Kangaroo program, an initiative originally from Colombia, was implemented in Cuba 15 years ago in the province of Pinar del Río and since then it has improved its work and adapted its criteria as part of maternal and child care, one of the priorities of the Public Health on the Caribbean island. (Text and photos: Dannys Hernández de Luaces/Radio Cadena Agramonte)
