Neonatal Perinatal Medicine at McMaster University Children’s Hospital.
The Neonatal Nurseries at McMaster Children’s Hospital.
The Children’s Hospital provides a wide scope of pediatric subspecialty services including perinatology, pediatric surgery, genetics, hematology, cardiology, nutrition, and gastroenterology among others. About 3,000 deliveries per year occur at the Medical Centre; many of these cases are high-risk and have been referred for care to the regional centre. The neonatal unit is a 47 bed tertiary unit that serves as a regional centre for the southwestern region of Ontario. The neonatal unit has approximately 1000 admissions annually, including 400 very low birth-weight babies. Seventy percent of neonatal unit admissions are born on site. The remainder are transferred after birth from the surrounding region which extends about 112 kilometres (70 miles) around Hamilton; the region has about 27,000 deliveries annually. Our neonatal transport team consists of two specially trained neonatal intensive care nurses, supplemented by neonatal fellows where indicated. The transport nurses perform delegated sanctioned medical acts (e.g. intubation) and have advanced clinical and communication skills. The transport team receives 400 – 500 calls each year.
The perinatal centre provides experience in antenatal consultation and in the delivery room management of high risk neonates, including preterm infants, multiple gestations, and an increasing number of infants with antenatally diagnosed anomalies.
The Neonatal Follow-up Clinic conducts the follow-up of infants of birthweight less than 1500 grams or high-risk infants born in the region.