Medical research helps Beacon advance health care for NICU babies

What does it mean to care with heart? A gentle touch, a smile, reassurance and kindness are all part of it. But caring with heart also means working to find answers and new information – constantly improving so that the care we provide to the community is the best it can be.

One of the places you’ll find this mindset is with the team who shapes and manages clinical research at Beacon Children’s Hospital. They’ve spent decades refining patient care based on science, and some of their most interesting research happens with our smallest, most delicate patients.

A small team with a large impact

Neonatalogist Robert White, MD, has been conducting world-class research in Beacon Children’s Hospital’s neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) for 42 years. For nearly 30 of those years, research coordinator Mashelle Monhaut has been assisting him. The team may be small, but their work has a big impact.

“Few people would imagine that some of the important research we have done here could be done at a non-university center,” said Dr. White. “But we succeed because we have an excellent team and a patient population whose families are willing to let their babies participate.”

The research they conduct has explored real lifesaving and life-changing issues:

• Testing a way to treat severe respiratory illness in very premature infants.
• Evaluating the use of caffeine to improve long-term neurodevelopmental outcomes for premature infants.
• Testing the effectiveness of a steroid medication in helping premature infants with severe breathing problems breathe without a ventilator more quickly.
• Evaluating whether an additive to a mother’s breast milk improves infant growth.

Some studies are created by them, while others involve partnerships with educational institutions, such as Rensselear Polytechnic Institute in New York. And because the hospital’s research program has an excellent reputation, companies sometimes invite Beacon to participate. According to Mashelle, there are generally three to four studies going on at once.

Improving digestion for premature babies

One of the studies currently underway may help with a condition called necrotizing enterocolitis, an intestinal disorder. It only affects a small number of premature infants, but it can quickly become fatal.

Being born prematurely puts a real strain on a baby’s body, including their intestines. After all, that organ normally wouldn’t need to function until the infant has developed for a full nine months. A premature infant’s tiny body sometimes can’t cope. But it’s extremely difficult to detect the problem until the baby is in severe distress and declining rapidly.

This study explores whether the use of a probiotic medication can help prevent babies from developing necrotizing enterocolitis. “This is the first international study – the first really big study – to see if it’s beneficial or not,” explained Mashelle.

Sarah and Kurt Foster with newborn daughter Layla in the NICU at Beacon Children’s Hospital

One of the study participants is Layla Fae Foster, who was born at 28 weeks and weighed just 1 lb., 14 oz. Her parents, Sarah and Kurt Foster, were grateful for the opportunity for Layla to participate in clinical research.

She had needed the maximum amount of oxygen that could safely be administered when she was born, as well as around-the-clock monitoring. The experience was a frightening one for her parents, so the idea of helping with a study that could benefit other families appealed to them.

“The research was specific to premature babies, so we could help people who were in the exact same position as us,” said Sarah. “We’re just proud to be able to participate in Dr. White’s research.”

Baby Layla today, all smiles

“Anything we could do to help, we were willing to do it,” added Kurt.

It will be some time before Sarah and Kurt learn whether their daughter received the study medication or not. (As a double-blinded study, even the Beacon research team doesn’t know until after the research is complete who received the study medication and who received a placebo.)  They’re simply grateful that Layla is thriving.

“It’s also a cool thing to tell her when she’s older,” said Sarah.

It’s all about the babies

When you love babies as much as Dr. White, providing care with heart in a NICU feels easy. The research helps make the care even better.

Dr. White explained how much he enjoys the connection with his patients and their families:

“If you want to take care of critically ill patients as kids or adults, you work in an intensive care unit (ICU). As they get better, they’re transferred out of the ICU, and somebody else takes care of them. But with babies, we get to continue to take care of them until they’re ready to go home. We have this opportunity to develop relationships with families that you could never do in an ICU setting.”

Every year, the hospital has a reunion for NICU families, with about a thousand people joining the fun. In addition, it’s not unusual for families to come back and visit, even years after the baby’s graduation from the NICU.

“Just this week, three of our graduates came back for various reasons,” said Dr. White. “One is ready to graduate from high school, and the others are four and five years old. That’s really the best part of the job.”