Breaking News for you from Infante Sano!

Infante Sano on Encuentro Latino THIS FRIDAY at 6:00pm!

Watch Infante Sano on Encuentro Latino this Friday!

Infante Sano and Executive Director Sarah Henry will be featured on this Friday's broadcast of Encuentro Latino on Telemundo (channel 60 in the Greater Boston area) at 6:00PM.

Encuentro Latino is a program which highlights issues that pertain to the Latino community in New England. With such topics as health, immigration, education, politics, entertainment and current events, Encuentro Latino is broadcast across the United States via Telemundo. Special programs are selected for internationally viewing---and the program featuring Infante Sano this Friday was chosen for this honor. Not only will we be broadcast in the US, but also in Europe and throughout Latin America and the Caribbean. The program will also air in the Dominican Republic, our pilot country.

Make sure to tune in!

Infante Sano in the news for recent C-Section Roundtable

Maria and Yessica Post C-section

On Tuesday, May 19th, Infante Sano held a national level roundtable in the DR to discuss the pervasive use of cesareans (c-sections), bringing together over 30 leaders from local and national hospitals, the Dominican Ministry of Health, USAID, Harvard University and Infante Sano.

In 2007, 44.3% of all women delivering babies in the DR had c-sections. This is shockingly high considering the World Health Organization recommends a country's c-section rate to be in the range of 10-15%. While c-sections can be life-saving procedures in critical cases, they carry increased risks for both mothers and their babies and should only be performed when medically necessary. Women are more at risk for hemorrhage during c-sections and fetal death is more likely to occur if they are ever pregnant again in the future. Every time a woman has a c-section, these risks increase exponentially for her and her baby.

While it is still unclear exactly why more women are having c-sections, we are seeing them occur more often in situations where vaginal delivery would have been the safer option for both mom and baby. Women, like Maria and Yessica, are not empowered to make informed decisions and are all too often rushed through the birth process, ending up with unnecessary surgery. Women and their babies are placed at increase risk and, given physician preferences, are more likely to have subsequent c-sections as their only option for future deliveries.

Infante Sano brought together this group of leading health professionals to discuss the potential causes for these increasing rates and brainstorm possible interventions to lower the use of unnecessary medical interventions that put women like Maria and Yessica at higher risk. This roundtable was a huge first step in developing a national response to increasing c-section rates in the DR and one that we are very proud to be an integral part of. To see several photos from the discussion, visit our blog. You can also visit our blog to read about the recent press coverage about C-section Rates and the Round Table in the Dominican Media. Several articles came out this week!

This meeting would not have been possible without you, our supporters. We are incredibly thankful for your support of our high quality programs, and for helping us to empower women and their clinicians to demand safer births.

A special, heartfelt thank you to the members of our team who took an idea and turned it into a successful reality: Infante Sano Staff - Sara Tolentino, Country Director, DR; Rachel Breman, Program Technical Advisor; Theamny Villar and Angel Moya and our wonderful volunteer OB/GYN, Dr. Marikim Bunnell!