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Note: Unfortunately, due to budget constraints, Skagit County Public Health eliminated the Welcome Baby Program as of March 31, 2009.
This website describes how the program operated.
We still have our non-profit, United Way of Skagit County organization, "Friends of Welcome Baby" that has, with the help of Kiwanis and Rotary, provided financial support for the Welcome Baby program.
The newsletters are no longer being mailed to families, but you may read them by clicking on the appropriate month on the newsletter page. We now have a book of the newletters available and this will be given to the families of newborns at both Skagit Valley and Island Hospitals.
Welcome Baby has been a joy for the past eleven years. It was an honor to serve the families and children of Skagit County. Please write to me at this web-site if you have ideas or questions. Just click on the "contact" section and your letter will reach me.
Meredith Baker
WELCOME
BABY! has been visiting
families at the Family Birth Center at Skagit Valley Hospital since January, 1998.
Hospital visits occur five days a week between the hours of 9:00 a.m. and early
afternoon.
As baby is welcomed, parents are congratulated and given a board book to take
home and read to baby.
A brief discussion follows about ways to comfort a crying newborn; infant development in the first few weeks; the development of language during baby’s
first year; and self care for mother and father. Parents are offered the series of developmenals newsletters, the first
of which is in their hospital packet.
Parents are asked if they would like to receive Washington
State’s Child Profile materials in a language other than English.
Unmet social service needs are addressed; resource and referral information
is given and follow-up appointments may be scheduled.
WELCOME BABY! provides weekly Mother-Baby
groups and free parent education for families
of all children birth to age 3.
WELCOME BABY! is sponsored by Skagit County Public Health. Community
and hospital volunteers are an active part
of our organization.
Skagit
Valley Hospital prints and provides mailing
service for the newsletters. There are approximately
1400 births a year in Skagit County and attempts
are made to visit and contact as many families
as possible
Island Hospital in Anacortes participates with Welcome Baby and families of newborns there receive both the newsletters and a book for their baby.
All funding for books & newsletter postage has come from private donations,
Kiwanis, Rotary, the North Cascades Health Council and United Way of Skagit
County.
WELCOME BABY! is a primary prevention
program, based on the Touchpoints principles
from Dr. T. Berry Brazelton’s program
in Boston, Massachusetts.
Affiliation with Baby TALK provides
ongoing training and educational opportunities for both parents and other professionals.
For more information, please email or telephone:
contact@welcomebabywa.org
WELCOME BABY! 360.419.3324
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