KHMHA Host Belize’s First-Ever Premature Birth Conference

Every year, over thirteen million babies are born prematurely worldwide. For the past seven years, healthcare professionals in Belize have been striving to reduce the number of premature births, but the trend hasn’t changed much. Premature births can lead to serious health issues like infections, internal bleeding, and seizures. To address this, the Karl Heusner Memorial Hospital Authority hosted Belize’s first-ever World Premature Day Conference. Neroli Williams, the Unit Manager of Natal and Intensive Care at K.H.M.H., gave us more insight into this pressing issue.

 

Neroli Williams, Unit Manager, Natal & Intensive Care, K.H.M.H.

“We decided to do a conference and target mostly the health care workers of this country, primarily the public health department because primary care is the first encounter of these pregnant ladies. So if we could improve on our primary care delivery, then we may have a decrease in premature births. Mommies, we have a lot of diabetes and hypertension in the country, and it’s on the rise. We’ve seen it in very young people. Even some children are developing diabetes from a very young age. So if we could get them to book clinic early, or their first visit that we call booking can be done early, at least  within the first two months. Then the care could continue and we could see if there is any risk factors that can be addressed. We have a lot of people from remote villages that don’t have the accessibility to healthcare is not as we may have it in Belize City or Belmopan or the urban areas. So if we could find these as some of the problems or issues that face our community, then we could target those areas in order to decrease these premature births.”