Skin-to-skin contact is good for your baby and you—and not just straight after birth

In the 1950s, the American psychologist Harry Harlow provided a stark demonstration of the importance of a mother’s touch. He famously—and controversially—showed that rhesus monkeys would rather cling to a surrogate “mother” made of soft cloth than one made of metal wire that provided milk. A loving touch seemed to be more important than food, Harlow concluded.

Experts unveil innovative fetal medicine data platform to inform interventions and treatments

An interprofessional team at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia is transforming CHOP’s approach to fetal medicine through a first-of-its-kind data integration platform. The Clinical Outcomes Data Archive (CODA) platform offers clinicians real-time data to help inform earlier interventions and treatment strategies in CHOP’s Richard D. Wood Jr. Center for Fetal Diagnosis and Treatment (CFDT). A paper outlining CODA’s benefits, applications and potential broader impact was recently published in the journal Fetal Diagnosis and Therapy.