Bothwell receives CuddleCot cooling device for pregnancy loss

The Blake Wagner Foundation recently donated a CuddleCot cooling pad and Moses basket to the Women’s Health and Newborn Care unit at Bothwell Regional Health Center. The portable device provides families who have experienced pregnancy loss the opportunity to spend additional time with their baby.

Pregnancy loss includes miscarriage, which is the loss of a baby before the 20th week of pregnancy, and stillbirth, which is the death or loss of a baby occurring between 20 and 40 weeks of completed pregnancy or during delivery. Last year, 66 patients at Bothwell Regional Health Center experienced pregnancy loss. The CuddleCot is used to cool the baby with a soft flexible cooling pad and attached cooling unit. The device allows parents and family members to be present with their baby and have more time to process their grief, bond and form memories as a family.

The Blake Wagner Foundation was started in 2011 by Crystal Wagner after her infant son was stillborn following a normal, full-term pregnancy. The foundation’s goal is to supply Missouri hospitals with CuddleCots to give grieving parents of stillborn babies the gift of time. Each CuddleCot placement costs about $3,000. The cost of Bothwell’s CuddleCot was donated by Keith and Angie Hayes, Janice Wieberg, Parker Hayes and Danielle Beltz, the family of Victoria Susan Lucille Hayes, who was stillborn in 1994.