Medicine: Discovery

A few modern pediatricians are suggesting a dreadfully old-fashioned practice: putting newborn babies in the same room with their mothers. Mrs. Frances P. Sim-sarian, mother of two, and Pediatrician Preston Alexander McLendon of Washington have made some happy discoveries about the procedure. Last month they enthusiastically told Journal of Pediatrics readers:

¶ When a baby stays in its mother’s room, the mother gets used to it while it is still in a very sleepy phase. She can feed it whenever it feels hungry—sometimes eleven times a day. Mother and baby are thus well started on breast feeding. Such babies soon adopt a fairly regular schedule. Meanwhile they coo a good deal and suck their fingers very little.

¶ When hospital crowding forces mothers to go home a few days after confinement, Dr. McLendon has noticed that they get used to their new infants easily, thus :utting down frantic phone calls to doctors and hospitals in fancied emergencies.