Off the Shelf – Fall 2021

At the ProMedica Russell J. Ebeid Children’s Hospital, 72 beds await babies born with challenges that make it too difficult to survive outside the womb unassisted. The Library’s Ready to Read program gives these children and their families a precious avenue for bonding and growth. The beeps are a steady soundtrack. The sounds of machinery supporting life have their own rhythm. In a newborn intensive care unit (NICU), these noises form a familiar backdrop for babies and their parents—a symphonic performance of sorts they had never hoped to hear but must now depend on day and night, as a matter of survival. Babies in the NICU are born prematurely, often needing oxygen support and unable to take a bottle, receiving food intravenously instead. They are born so small they often cannot be held for a certain amount of time after the delivery; other times they have complicating conditions that make it impossible to live outside a hospital in the early days of their life. Continue Reading