Daryn Collins, MD, MPH

On Nov. 4, 2019, the Birth Center at the New Ulm Medical Center (NUMC) began an exciting new collaboration with Children’s Minnesota. The Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) team at Children’s Minnesota, which includes neonatal nurse practitioners and neonatology physicians, now offers remote, on-demand, real-time video and audio consultation with the Birth Center team at NUMC. This virtual care technology supports the highly trained team of pediatric physicians, nurses, and respiratory therapists already in place at NUMC and is being used “at the cribside” to enhance the care of newborns that may have difficulty with their initial transition period due to prematurity, breathing difficulty, infection or other problems. The technology is available 24 hours a day and 7 days a week.

Approximately 350 infants are delivered at NUMC each year. Fortunately, most babies do very well after they are born. Approximately 3% of babies born at NUMC have difficulty that requires transfer to the NICU at Children’s Minnesota for further evaluation and treatment. This technology provides a personal connection, also allowing parents to communicate with a NICU provider face to face to review their baby’s ongoing care. In some cases, severe weather can delay or prevent the Children’s NICU transport team from arriving at NUMC in a timely fashion. When difficulty arises for distressed babies, the experienced care team at the Birth Center at NUMC is well prepared to provide support. We now have an extra set of special eyes and ears to help ensure we are providing the best possible care to babies born in New Ulm and their families. This technology may help decrease the number of babies that need to be transferred from NUMC to the NICU, in turn keeping babies and families together in as many cases as possible. Other regional sites across the Allina Health system have also implemented this technology. Their experience has shown that this partnership helps improve communication among care team members during what can be challenging situations.

We look forward to the ongoing partnership between the Birth Center at NUMC and the Children’s NICU virtual care team, which allows us to continue to provide babies and families in our community with high quality, patient centered care. This partnership was made possible by a generous contribution from the New Ulm Medical Center Foundation.