Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital has been recognized as a Gold Safe Sleep Hospital by Cribs for Kids, a Pittsburgh-based organization dedicated to preventing infant, sleep-related deaths due to accidental suffocation.

“This recertification reflects the work of our health care team in our role as a leading educator in our community on how to protect sleep-related infant deaths,” said Michele Jeski, MSN, RN, PCNS-BC, CPN, pediatric clinical nurse specialist at Upstate Golisano.

Upstate Golisano received the honor for following safe sleep guidelines recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics and by providing training programs for health care team members and family caregivers.

Those guidelines include:

--Training staff working with children under one year of age on infant safe sleep

--Providing infant safe sleep education to parents of infants prior to discharge

--Using wearable blankets in the nursery and inpatient pediatric units

--Conducting outreach activities related to infant safe sleep

--Sending a consistent message about safe sleep to families

--Role modeling what families should be doing at home

Upstate screens all patients under 1 year of age to make sure they have an independent safe sleep surface at home. If the assessment indicates they don’t, Upstate provides a pack ‘n play for families to take home and use free of charge. The pack ‘n plays are provided to families for free thanks to funding from the Upstate Foundation and Safe Kids Upstate New York Coalition.

In addition, The Safe Kids Upstate New York Coalition coordinates the community outreach and education component required for the Safe Sleep certification.

“Sleep-related death (SRD) results in the loss of more than 3,500 infants every year in the United States, said Michael H. Goodstein, M.D. neonatologist and medical director of research at Cribs for Kids. “We know that modeling safe infant sleep in the hospital and providing education to families has a significant effort on infant mortality. Cribs for Kids Hospital Certification Program is designed to recognize those hospitals that are taking an active role in reducing these preventable deaths.

Upstate Golisano received its first five-year certification as a Gold Safe Sleep Hospital in 2018.

Caption: Displaying the Gold Safe Sleep Hospital certificate are, from left, Brenda Dano, deputy director of Nursing for Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital; Michelle Jeski, pediatric clinical nurse specialist for Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital; Liz Sapio, Safe Kids Upstate NY coordinator; and Dr Gregory Conners, professor and chair of Pediatrics and executive director of Upstate Golisano Children’s Hospital.