“Kangaroo care,” or skin-to-skin contact, may be neuroprotective and is associated with neonatal development in areas of the brain involved in emotional regulation in preterm infants, according to a new preliminary study from Weill Cornell Medicine, Burke Neurological Institute and Stanford Medicine investigators. Even short sessions correlated with noticeable effects on brain imaging scans, which is important because more than half of preterm infants have risk for neurodevelopmental impairment.
The findings of the retrospective study, published Sept. 24 in Neurology, the medical journal of the American Academy of Neurology, could ultimately lead to better neurological outcomes for preterm infants and a wider adoption of kangaroo care in neonatal intensive care units (NICUs).
Dr. Katie Travis
