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What is Skin-to-Skin? 
Skin to skin contact is when an infant wearing only a diaper is placed on a bare chest of their mother or father in a prone and semi-upright position and is covered with a blanket. Basically the newborn’s skin is touching the mother’s skin. Origin of Skin-to-SkinThe origin of skin to skin holding began in 1980 in Bogota, Columbia, due to shortages of incubators for premature babies. The nursing staff decided to incorporate kangaroo care and use the mothers as a way to maintain infant’s temperature (Feldman, 2004 & Johnson, 2005).There has been research done that has proven that healthy term infants also greatly benefit from this intervention. Hospitals in North America are promoting skin to skin contact on maternity units but this practice needs to be implemented during the PKU testing as well. |
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What is PKU Testing? 
After 24 hours of age all newborns in North America receive a PKU (phenylketonuria) screening test. PKU is a metabolic disorder characterized by a missing liver enzyme which results with the body unable to breakdown an essential amino acid. (Pillitteri, 2007).The inability to breakdown this amino acid can lead to permanent damage to brain tissue. PKU needs to be detected early in the newborn to prevent further damage. If a PKU test comes back positive, a newborn will be put on a strict formula diet that will have very minimal amount of the amino acid (Pillitteri, 2007). How is PKU Testing done?The infant’s heel is pricked with a blood lancet and a few drops of blood are collected onto a specially prepared filtered paper, which is then analyzed in the lab (Pillitteri, 2007).Newborns experience pain during PKU testing from the pricking. It has been established that babies do in fact perceive pain (Choonara, 1999; Dabrowski, 2007).
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During you baby's PKU test, request to hold your baby skin-to-skin! |
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Created by Sabina Medanhodzic and Karolina Topola 2008 |