Preemie Team

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Appears in the September 2024 issue.

The NICU Aftercare Clinic at Hummingbird Pediatric Therapies helps parents navigate life with their new babies

A team of pediatric therapists—including physical therapist Jacob Cetera (center)—works with infants at the NICU Aftercare Clinic at Hummingbird Pediatric Therapies.
A team of pediatric therapists—including physical therapist Jacob Cetera (center)—works with infants at the NICU Aftercare Clinic at Hummingbird Pediatric Therapies.

Last fall, Abigail Beard was 34 weeks pregnant with twins when she and her husband, David, traveled from their home in Normal, Illinois, to Hinsdale to celebrate with friends and family at their baby shower. While in town, Beard ended up delivering their son and daughter early, and the babies required a five-month stay in a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

“The biggest advice we were given in the NICU with medically complex infants—apart from regular infant care—was therapy,” Beard says. “Physical, occupational, feeding—all those kinds of therapy.” The family was relieved to find the support and treatment they needed all in one place with the NICU Aftercare Clinic at Hummingbird Pediatric Therapies in the western suburbs.

“Having a baby born premature or a baby that needs a NICU stay, you have so much support in the NICU, and then you’re discharged home, and it’s like, ‘What do I do with this little baby now?’ ” says Christina Morrissey, pediatric speech pathologist and owner and CEO of Hummingbird Pediatric Therapies. She started her practice in Hinsdale 30 years ago and now has locations in Woodridge (9018 Heritage Pkwy.), Westmont (750 Pasquinelli Dr.), and a newly opened clinic in Elmhurst (501 W. Lake St.). The practice offers a wide array of services for babies and children, including speech, occupational, physical, Dynamic Movement Intervention, and feeding therapies.

A man and woman playing with a baby

Through Hummingbird’s NICU Aftercare Clinic—a program offered at all three locations—parents of preemies can work with a team of therapists all in the same place during the same appointment time. This helps reduce the mental load that parents take on when it comes to relaying information among their child’s therapists and makes for a lower-stress experience with continuity of care, says Jacob Cetera, clinical outreach manager and physical therapist at Hummingbird. “[As a parent of a NICU baby,] you are putting a lot of pressure on yourself to become the child’s social worker…and emotionally it becomes too much,” Cetera says. “The quality of care is so much more comprehensive here because it’s all under one roof. If you tell one therapist something here, we all know and we have a team approach.”

Beard credits the Hummingbird team for helping her and her husband navigate the challenges of caring for their medically complex twins. “My daughter has a severe oral aversion, and [our therapists] are helping me work through that. She also gets very, very tired very quickly when it comes to eating,” Beard says. Her daughter recently received a new nasogastric tube for feeding. “For my son, the biggest thing is getting him moving and making sure that if cerebral palsy is an issue, that we diagnose it right away so we can get in front of it.”

A typical therapy session for infants at Hummingbird might include physical therapy (PT) for muscle development, occupational therapy (OT) to help with daily caregiving tasks, and feeding therapy (to help support breastfeeding, bottle feeding, or a feeding tube), all strategically timed within one appointment. “We don’t want to have [a baby] do a feed and then do PT and OT sessions and be on their stomach,” Cetera says. That would be a one-way ticket to spit-up city. “We can do the PT and OT first together as a cotreatment, and then have that feeding session after to maximize all the therapeutic gains.”

Did you know?

September is NICU Awareness Month, and September 30 is NICU Awareness Day (nicuawareness.org).

 

Photos: Hummingbird Pediatric Therapies