Medical City Healthcare donates $5,000 for Prematurity Awareness Month
Medical City Healthcare donates $5,000 to March of Dimes for Prematurity Awareness Month.
Dallas — With more than one in 10 babies in the U.S. born preterm, Medical City Healthcare is supporting the 20th anniversary of the March of Dimes’ Prematurity Awareness Month this November with a $5,000 donation and by recognizing the extraordinary awareness efforts of a colleague who lost a baby after a premature birth.
A longtime supporter of the March of Dimes’ mission to lead the fight for healthy moms and strong babies, Medical City Healthcare facilitated $150,000 in donations this year for the MOD’s annual March for Babies – and now adds an extra $5,000 donation towards ending preventable preterm births and infant deaths. Babies born too early often face life-threatening complications and may have lifelong health problems, according to the March of Dimes.
Medical City Healthcare is also celebrating a MOD awareness initiative organized by colleague Alexis Burnett, who was inspired to go the extra mile after her family’s service as Ambassadors for the Cause for the 2023 MOD March for Babies. Burnett, who lost her infant son, Hudson, eight years ago after he was born prematurely, organized and completed a 29-mile fundraising run on Nov. 9 to advance the March of Dimes’ work.
Hudson’s twin brother, Ash, turns 8 years old on Nov. 9. To honor both of them, Burnett ran 29 miles from Medical City Alliance, the site of her preterm labor, to Medical City Lewisville, where her family was cared for in the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU). Colleagues, friends and family cheered her efforts from start to finish and also donated to the March of Dimes in heartfelt support. At the finish line, Medical City Healthcare’s division vice president for women’s and children’s services, Laura Swaney, presented a check for $5,000 to the March of Dimes for Prematurity Awareness Month.
“Out of the 20,000 babies delivered at a Medical City Healthcare facility in 2023, nearly 6,500 required a higher level of care and admission to one of our eight NICUs,” says Swaney, who served as chair for the March of Dimes 2024 Dallas March for Babies: A Mother of a Movement™ walk. “Medical City Healthcare is honored to recognize Prematurity Awareness Month, and we applaud our dedicated colleagues working to make a difference for moms and babies everywhere.”
Burnett is a nurse leader who worked at several Medical City Healthcare hospitals and is now vice president of surgical services for HCA Healthcare, the parent company of Medical City Healthcare. She also advanced prematurity awareness in a touching video.