Bringing Care to Life
Learning the basic steps of newborn resuscitation with a training doll
We created two films to teach the basic steps of newborn resuscitation using the Helping Babies Breathe guidelines: one with live footage and one using a training doll. Our newest release—Helping Babies Breathe with a Training Doll—was filmed in a busy maternity in Ghana. It depicts the key steps in a resuscitation just as they would take place at a live birth. For example, after the baby (the doll) is born, we see the “baby” being placed on the mother’s abdomen and the drying of the “baby.”
Showing the resuscitation of a training doll with this approach adds realism to the procedure, especially in teaching key steps such as where to place the baby for resuscitation and when to cut the cord—steps that are best shown when the doll is “resuscitated” in an actual birth setting.
Helping Babies Breathe is an evidence-based hands-on training program developed for low-resource settings by the American Academy of Pediatrics. Training birth attendants in neonatal resuscitation is critical to helping save the one million babies who die each year from birth asphyxia (WHO).