Understanding Newborn Behavior and Early Relationships

Giving babies a "voice" helps parents understand their baby's unique strengths and needs. This observational tool and handbook, complete with beautiful four-color photographs by a Pulitzer prize-winning photographer, gives professionals a systematic way to help parents respond with confidence to their baby's individual needs—and build positive parent–professional relationships in the process. Flexible, easy to integrate into everyday practice, and based on more than 25 years of research, this system includes

• A short, easy-to-use, interactive observational tool. With the Newborn Behavioral Observations (NBO) system, professionals will have a structured set of 18 observations for infants from birth to approximately 3 months. Including parents as partners, professionals guide the observation, discuss the baby's abilities and behaviors with parents, encourage parent insights and questions, and suggest specific ways to support the child's development. (Appropriate use of the NBO tool in clinical practice requires training through the NBO training program.)
• A complete guide to the NBO system. Through realistic case studies, step-by-step how-to instructions, and color photos illustrating each NBO item, professionals will understand how to use the NBO effectively with a wide variety of families.
• Invaluable professional guidance. More than a tool, the handbook helps professionals improve their daily work with in-depth information on infant and parent development, cultural competence, premature and at-risk infants, family–centered care, and more.

An essential resource from the co-author of the highly regarded Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS)

and his colleagues, this system is just what clinicians in hospital, clinic, or home settings need to help new mothers and fathers get to know their baby, increase their confidence and competence as parents, and support their child's growth and development.

J. Kevin Nugent is Director of The Brazelton Institute at Children's Hospital Boston, and Lecturer at Harvard Medical School. Dr. Nugent is a developmental psychologist and Founder and Director of The Brazelton Institute at Children's Hospital Boston. He is co-author with Dr. Berry Brazelton of the Neonatal Behavioral Assessment Scale (NBAS) and has directed the NBAS training program since 1978. Dr. Nugent has conducted research on newborn behavior and parent–child relations in different cultural settings around the world and has published extensively on topics in infant and child development. In addition, he has written the manual Using the NBAS with Infants and Parents (March of Dimes Foundation, 1985) and is senior author of the series The Cultural Context of Infancy (Vols. 1 and 2; Ablex 1989, 1991). Dr. Nugent is editor of Ab Initio, the international journal for professionals working with infants and families.

Dr. Keefer is a faculty member of The Brazelton Institute at Children’s Hospital Boston, and Assistant Professor at Harvard Medical School.

Dr. Keefer, a board-certified pediatrician, has worked as a researcher and teacher in the field of infant–parent relations for 30 years. She has conducted research on newborns and young children in Kenya, has worked as a community physician, and was Director of the Newborn Nursery in the Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH) in Boston, where she developed a curriculum in primary care neonatology for residents and the PEBE (the combined physical and behavioral neonatal examination) to help promote a more parent-centered approach to newborn care. Currently, Dr. Keefer is an attending pediatrician in the BWH Newborn Nursery and is also on the faculty of The Brazelton Touchpoints Center at Children's Hospital Boston, where she trains providers in aspects of early childhood development.

Susan Minear, M.D., is Director of the Birth to Three Program at Boston Medical Center; She is also Assistant Professor of Pediatrics at Boston University School of Medicine,.

Dr. Minear (formerly O'Brien) practices primary care pediatrics and is a board-certified behavioral and developmental pediatrician and a graduate fellow of the Zero to Three Leadership Development Initiative. From 1997 to 2005, Dr. Minear served as Medical Director of the Newborn Nursery at Boston Medical Center, where she worked to transform a traditional newborn nursery practice into a developmentally rich service for newborns and families. Dr. Minear incorporated the NBO into newborn care and into medical student and resident education. She implemented an infant massage program and was a cochairperson of the Baby Friendly task force through which Boston Medical Center achieved the World Health Organization's Baby Friendly status, a designation for hospital organizations that successfully follow the Ten Steps program to provide support for breast-feeding mothers.

Lise C. Johnson is Director of Well Newborn Nurseries at Brigham and Women's Hospital. She is also an instructor in Pediatrics at Harvard Medical School, and a faculty member at The Brazelton Institute.

Dr. Johnson is a board-certified pediatrician. Prior to focusing her clinical work and teaching on newborns, she worked for 10 years as a primary pediatrician in the greater Boston area. She integrates the NBO into her practice with newborns and their families and into her training of residents and medical students.

Dr. Blanchard teaches the pediatric curriculum of the physical therapy program at the University of Hartford and is a faculty member of The Brazelton Institute where she is the lead NBAS trainer and an NBO trainer. She is also an early intervention provider for the East Hartford Birth to Three Program in Connecticut. Dr. Blanchard has published more than 15 articles and 4 book chapters relating to the field of pediatric physical therapy and early intervention with high-risk infants.