Hospitals Are Looking for Volunteers to Cuddle Newborn Babies!

If you are looking to get some volunteer work in, here’s an option!

Hospitals around the country are looking for people who can come in and cuddle babies – especially those in the NICU.

Why would they need that? Well, it’s very important for newborns to get skin-to-skin contact, and many times the parents are unable for many reasons.

Enter the baby cuddler volunteers!

Here’s the volunteer posting from the University of Illinois Health website:

NICU Baby Cuddling
Research has shown that infants who are held demonstrate greater growth, physiological stability, and have shorter hospital stays than infants without that opportunity. Since critically-ill newborns are frequently hospitalized for an extended period of time, parents find themselves emotionally and physically torn between their desires to visit with their infants and other life responsibilities. The Cuddle Program uses extensively trained volunteers to support the families of infants by providing comfort to their hospitalized infant. Through training, Cuddlers learn to handle, hold, rock, and cuddle stable infants-as an extension of the parents’ role, as they convalesce from premature birth or other illnesses.

If this sounds like something you’d enjoy doing, call up your local hospital to see if they have a baby cuddled program!