Finalist
Good to Grow – positive steps for prematurity
Summary of work
Good to Grow is an innovative Strategic Health Initiative, conceptualised and supported by AbbVie, already helping to engage multiple stakeholders, including healthcare professionals, to work together differently to maximise resources, infrastructure and policies to improve standards of care, treatment and support for babies born too soon.
Every year 15 million babies worldwide are born prematurely. Being born early affects babies’ cardiac, respiratory, neurological and nutritional development, potentially having acute and/or long term impacts on infant development. Although the highest medical costs of prematurity happen during the neonatal period, additional costs are incurred throughout childhood resulting in significant longer term costs to healthcare systems.
Through the implementation of impactful communication tools, the initiative has directly influenced policy, guidelines and standards of care in 10 countries. Good to Grow has captured the imagination of a huge range of stakeholders, from doctors and nurses, to policymakers and politicians, teachers and, of course, parents themselves. To date, 19 Good to Grow coalitions have been established around the world, improving overall standards of care and access to treatment, care and support for premature infants.
Judges’ comments
This is an impressive example of collaboration between a large number of varied stakeholders, from teachers, lawyers and the government. Achieving meaningful, sustainable collaboration by bringing these groups together and achieving significant change in policy is laudable. There are great outcomes in terms of the patient monitoring programmes and getting the government committed to increasing neonatal programmes. This is what collaboration should be about.
