Description of The Sacred Hour: Uninterrupted Skin to Skin Immediately After Birth

How a baby is welcomed into the world matters! Healthy newborn infants belong with their mothers. Being skin to skin with mother supports physiologic stability during the transition to life outside the womb. Mother's chest is where newborns feel most safe and secure and where babies instinctively find the breast, without assistance, for their first breastfeeding. Separation from mother induces high levels of stress in the newborn with both short- and long-term consequences.  In this presentation we will discuss the evidence from research and experience about the importance of avoiding separation of mothers and newborns. We will also discuss practical ways to achieve uninterrupted skin-to-skin contact between stable newborns and mothers immediately after both vaginal and cesarean births.

About Raylene M. Phillips, MD, MA, IBCLC, FABM, FAAP,

Raylene M. Phillips, MD, MA, IBCLC, FABM, FAAP, Assistant Professor of Pediatrics Loma Linda University Children’s Hospital Division of Neonatology.

After raising three children as a stay-at-home mother, Dr. Phillips received a Masters degree in Developmental Psychology, became NIDCAP certified as an Infant Developmental Specialist, and then attended medical school at University of California, Davis, graduating in 2004. She completed her pediatric residency and neonatology fellowship at Loma Linda University Children's Hospital in Loma Linda, CA and is currently an attending neonatologist in the NICU at the same hospital as well as Medical Director of Newborn Nursery at Loma Linda University Medical Center-Murrieta. Dr. Phillips is an International Board Certified Lactation Consultant and is a Fellow of the Academy of Breastfeeding Medicine. She is the current President of the National Perinatal Association. Her primary areas of interest are mother-infant attachment, breastfeeding education and support, and Family-Centered Neuroprotective Care of premature infants in the NICU.