Newborn Visiting Program Improves Community by Hiring more Nurses
Durham, N.C. (October 23, 2008) -
Durham County, N.C. – In effort to improve the overall well-being and prosperity of the Durham community, the Durham Connects newborn nurse visiting program has met its initial hiring goal of 10 nurse visitors. The new program will ultimately provides free in-home nurse visits to all parents of newborns in Durham County. Its first phase goal was to hire 10 nurses to cover half of the county’s population by the end of 2008. Nurses are assigned to neighborhoods and will be visiting newborns in those areas. Phase two of the program will begin in January, 2010 with another 10 nurses hired to cover the remainder of the county.
“We know that providing positive experiences early in a child’s life will safeguard their developing brain architecture,” said Jeannine Sato, director of the Office of Community Resources for Durham Connects. “Our first challenge was to hire 10 high quality registered nurses for the program. The nursing field is competitive, however, we had a wonderful response from the medical community and these positions filled faster than we could have expected. We believe this is a testament to the novelty and quality of the Durham Connects program.”
The Durham Connects program is a partnership between the Durham County Health Department and the Durham Family Initiative. It expects to visit more than 4,000 families when fully operational. Nurses provide a new parent welcome bag, a free physical assessment of mother and baby, newborn education and referrals where needed. Durham Connects is funded by The Duke Endowment. For more information, please visit www.durhamconnects.org or call (919) 668-3279.
Contact: Jeannine Sato, 668-3295, [email protected].
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