Hygeia     Ephemeris Project      Get...Care

A History and Summary of Hygeia® and the Hygeia Foundation, Inc.

In an effort to console my patients at a most tragic and vulnerable time in their lives—the death of their child through miscarriage, stillbirth and neonatal death, I began to write poetry. I sent these poems to them and read them at funerals and memorial services. When I realized that these personal expressions were helpful, I prepared to publish a book of poetry. At first this was not accepted for publication, so in an effort to self-publish, in 1995-1996 I created a website, http://hygeia.org; very novel at that time!   I called the program Hygeia after the Greek goddess of health and healing. The Hygeia Foundation, Inc. and Institute for Perinatal Loss and Bereavement is a non Profit, 501-c-3 organization with a Board of Directors, a Medical Advisory Board and a Parents Board. The Hygeia Foundation was founded and developed from this website. My book, Parenthood Lost: Healing the Pain After Miscarriage, Stillbirth and Infant Death was published in 2001.

Each year in the U.S. 30,000 infants die within the first 28 days of life. (1 in 144) and 25,000 (1 in 123) are stillborn.  One in five families experience the pain of miscarriage (approx. 900,000). The impact of these losses is great, affecting parents, surviving siblings, grandparents, extended families and friends. Talking to one’s health care provider and accessing the full range of physical and psycho-social support required is often a challenge. Although bereavement support is available by mostly branches of national organizations, the support is fractured and difficult to access. Families reaching out for support, or experiencing a recent loss, require support which is available when they need it, not when the monthly support group meets. Families desire and require support that is tailored to their specific needs. For example a family who has lost a child and is considering conceiving again or coping with subsequent pregnancy has very different needs than a family trying to make decisions regarding funeral arrangements for their recently departed child. Such is the mission of the Hygeia Foundation, Inc. We believe all individuals searching for solace should have access to these resources,  particularly those medically underserved and indigent families who grieve in silence over their loss and cannot take advantage of them. Hygeia aims to be a model for best practices in bereavement care when a family leaves the doctor’s office or hospital after a loss. For thirteen years the Hygeia Foundation has been an on-line source of information and support for families experiencing these types of losses and is also a source of information for health care providers caring for families facing the loss of a child. The Hygeia Foundation comforts families of all socio-economic and ethnic backgrounds who have experienced the tragedies of pregnancy loss and neonatal death.

In June, 2007 The Hygeia Foundation Headquarters opened its doors in New Haven (now in Woodbridge), Connecticut. The organization has since successfully linked bereaved families with trained peer support persons (all of whom have suffered the loss of a baby themselves) who are available via phone, on-line, or in person at the Hygeia office. Hygeia currently holds regular support group meetings at the Hygeia Foundation Center in Woodbridge, Connecticut, and in donated space in Guilford, Connecticut and Westport, Connecticut. The support groups include Pregnancy and Neonatal Loss, Pregnancy after Loss, and a new program, Parenting After Loss.  In addition, in collaboration with the New Haven Department of Health, the

Hygeia Foundation Bereavement Fund provides up to $100 to a family who needs funding to bury or cremate the remains of their child.  It is also our commitment to educate and support healthcare professionals as they care for their patients experiencing perinatal and neonatal loss. Other aspects of our program include a resource library available to bereaved families and a parent-facilitated seminar in perinatal loss for medical students and residents at the Yale University School of Medicine/Yale- New Haven Hospital, moderated by  Dr. Berman.

For more information about the Hygeia Foundation, Inc., please visit our Website at http://hygeiafoundation.org  or http://hygeia.org .  For more information about Dr. Berman, please visit his website at http://mrbmd.com .