Written by Maria Yager
Blanchfield Army Community Hospital Public Affairs
Fort Campbell, KY – Blanchfield Army Community Hospital will host its first ever Baby Expo, May 25th, 2018 from 10:00am to 2:00pm at Fort Campbell’s Family Readiness Center.
“We’re very excited to bring this expo to Fort Campbell. The Baby Expo is an educational fair that allows families to be connected with community resources here at Fort Campbell and the surrounding city-community. It’s also great because we get to see face-to-face the patients who we will be serving here on the Mother-Baby Unit and on the Labor, Delivery and Recovery Unit,” said 1st Lt. Alison Wegenke, Clinical Nurse Officer in Charge on Blanchfield’s Mother-Baby Unit.
The Baby Expo is geared for new parents, parents who are expecting a baby and parents planning to get pregnant.
More than 40 educators and vendors will be on hand to answer beneficiaries’ questions and discuss available services. Topics include, hospital packing list, new parent support group, swaddling and diaper changes, epidurals and labor medications, breastfeeding, car seat safety, nutrition, TRICARE, immunizations, well-baby care and more.
Army Community Services, Child, Youth and School Services, American Red Cross and the USO will also have information booths available.
Participants may also enter to win one of several baby-themed gift baskets assembled and donated by different departments from the hospital, as well as goody bags donated by local vendors.
Baby Expo planners hope to answer questions and provide information to beneficiaries who want to learn more about their pregnancy, delivery or new baby.
“I think it’s just a great way for parents who are transitioning to Fort Campbell, maybe right before they deliver a baby or after they’ve delivered a baby, to learn. This sort of connects them with those resources,” said Wegenke.
The Baby Expo is free and available for TRICARE beneficiaries. Refreshments will be available for purchase.
Blanchfield Army Community Hospital helps deliver more than 150 babies each month at its state-of- the-art Labor, Delivery and Recovery Unit. The hospital features seven labor suites and two labor and delivery operating rooms. After recovery, mother’s and new babies stay in one of the hospital’s 20 private suites on the Mother-Baby unit to continue their recuperation and medical treatment until they are ready to be discharged from the hospital.
Blanchfield provides primary care services and numerous specialty care services, including emergency medicine, surgery, integrated disability evaluation, traumatic brain injury, behavioral health and inpatient care to nearly 97,000 eligible beneficiaries within a 40-mile radius of Fort Campbell.
Fort Campbell’s Family Readiness Center is located at 1501 William C. Lee Road, Fort Campbell.
