After your baby is discharged, his or her medical care will be provided by the pediatrician or family physician you have chosen. You will be advised when to schedule your baby's first appointment. A summary of your baby's hospital record will be sent to your baby's pediatrician or family physician.

Because your child's future is very important to us, St. John's Mercy Medical Center offers a NICU Follow-up Program. Through this program, children are evaluated during important periods of development by pediatric specialists highly trained to assess developmental skills. The program consists of six visits over the first seven years, and each visit lasts two hours.

We assess the following areas: fine and gross motor skills; cognitive (intellectual) development; speech and language development; social and play skills. These skills are important, because it is through these avenues that a child develops. Development occurs in a natural order and every child follows the same basic sequence. Some children develop faster and some more slowly, but all travel pretty much the same path. In the sequence of development, the child uses each activity to develop "building blocks" that become the basis for more complex and mature developments. At each follow-up visit, we check to make sure your child's "building blocks" are well in place.

If your baby's doctor recommends that your baby be enrolled in the Follow-up Program, the nurse coordinator will discuss this program with you in detail, answer any questions and schedule your baby's first follow-up visit.

We offer the Follow-up Program to look closely at all areas of development so we can give you needed information and advice. We hope that you will view the Follow-up Program as a resource for support, new ideas, sharing and reassurance. We welcome the opportunity to be closely involved with your family in the future.

© 2008 St. John's Mercy Health Care
615 S. New Ballas Rd., St. Louis, Missouri, 63141