HEALTHY START RETREAT TO SAVE BABIES

Health and family service representatives attended the Bootheel Healthy Start Retreat Friday to learn how to reduce infant death rate and disease in Southeast Missouri.

More than 100 people attended the event, held at the Holiday Inn Convention Center. Local, regional and national speakers were scheduled to discuss issues related to low birth weight babies and infant mortality.

"We're a committed group of people getting together to discuss a specific issue," said Cynthia Dean, Bootheel Healthy Start director. "We're working to change attitudes about how parents see this project, how they see their families and how they see their healthy babies."

Bootheel Healthy Start was created nearly two years ago out of concern for the rate of infant deaths in the Bootheel. The group's purpose is to eliminate the factors that contribute to infant death and the rate of low birth-weight babies born in the region.

The group is funded through the Sudden Infant Death Syndrome Resources corporation in St. Louis.

"The rates of low birth weight births are almost one and one-half times in the Bootheel as it is in the rest of the state," said Dr. Laura Hillman, medical director for SIDS Resources. "We're working as a preventative agency in trying to improve low birth weight and infant mortality in general."

Dean said Bootheel Healthy Start targets families in Scott, Mississippi, Dunklin, Pemiscot and New Madrid counties. The groups offer information through networks at hospitals, health departments and government agencies in rural towns.

Other groups, including service clubs and churches, are also helping the agency.

"Churches are major players and we cannot afford to exclude them from our efforts," said Dean. "We can do it but we must work together, because the problems are too big for one agency alone to handle."

Bootheel Healthy Start sponsors programs on parenting issues and holds community baby showers for young mothers. The group also sponsors male Responsibility Initiative meetings and fishing clinics to foster mentoring between adult men and teen-agers.

"All too often we focus on the mothers and forget about the men," said Dean. "We want to work together to concentrate on building healthy families."