Hospitals on holidays can be difficult for families.

“Those are the hardest moments to be here, when you really, really wish you could be anywhere else celebrating that holiday with your baby,” said Aimee Karas, an advanced child life specialist in the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s newborn/infant intensive care unit.

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That’s why, Karas said, it’s so important for everyone caring for the babies to try to infuse those moments with a little bit of joy. So Karas and her team offer families the chance to have their babies dressed up for Halloween. It gives families a chance to pause, even if it’s just for 10 to 15 minutes, as their babies are gently tucked into costumes, to “take several pictures, to really celebrate that moment of a baby’s first Halloween, which in our case is always the case,” Karas said.

“What we’re trying to do with efforts like this is to kind of mimic or match whatever the family would want to be doing with their baby if they weren’t in the hospital. … Many families celebrate every month that their baby is alive. So celebrating month milestones, celebrating holidays, celebrating important first days in a family’s life … that they pass in the N/IICU in terms of their treatment, those are all celebrations that we want to support.”

CHOP opened the first surgical N/IICU in the United States in 1962 and now treats about 1,000 babies a year. The Philadelphia campus is a level four N/IICU, providing the highest level of medical care for infants. CHOP also has a level three N/IICU in King of Prussia. 

The N/IICU treats premature babies born as early as 23 weeks gestation and as small as one pound, all the way through babies up to age 1, for respiratory, cardiac, genetic, renal, neurological, hematological and metabolic diseases.

Teams of occupational and physical therapists, speech language pathologists, music therapists and child life specialists surround each baby in the N/IICU to make sure they continue to try to meet developmental milestones alongside their medical care while they are in the hospital.

“If a baby is in the hospital for the first six months of their life, we certainly do not want their developmental goals to sort of fall by the wayside, because they happen to be spending that time here,” Karas said.

Provided Image/Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia

Teddy, pictured with his mother and grandmother, is dressed as a penguin for Halloween in the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia’s newborn/infant intensive care unit.

Child life specialists are embedded in every unit at CHOP, including in outpatient areas, to help families have as positive an experience as possible, “whether that is empowering the child to be an active member in their own treatment team and help make decisions and choices, or if that’s down here in the N/IICU, where primarily we’re working with parents or maybe siblings to help them understand their baby a little bit better,” Karas said. “But everywhere we are, we’re working to meet families and try to make their experience here less traumatic and a little bit more positive.”

Many families are surprised that their preemies and newborns in the N/IICU can wear Halloween costumes, Karas said. For the preemies who are not yet able to wear clothes, Karas and her team have Halloween-themed footies, gloves, swaddles and bows. Karas said her team has learned through the years that costumes that pull on or zip up the front are the easiest for the babies. 

“Sometimes, we’re cutting small holes (in the fabric) so tubes can go through, so we can get strategic and get creative,” Karas said.