Not every baby is born happy and healthy. Some are born prematurely, some get incredibly sick when they are born, and some require specialist treatments for specific conditions. Not every neonatal unit is equipped to manage certain conditions, and this is when the team at Connect North West step in, moving the newborns so that they can have the care they need.

Connect North West is a neonatal transportation service with ambulances that transport babies to and from hospitals. Based in Warrington, they cover the whole of the North West region (that's 22 hospitals!) and cover North Wales overnight, and can do so immediately thanks to their dedicated ambulances.

The team often have some transfers booked in, but many are on-the-day cases that require urgent attention. The service mostly connects hospitals in the North West, but the team have occasionally ended up as far as London's Great Ormond Street Hospital when a baby needs highly specialised services!

Your donations will help the team to improve the patient journey and the experience of the parents who travel with them in the ambulance. Little things such as providing a bear (like Connie pictured above) can be used to calm and distract unwell babies during acute transfers, and then become a memento of their journey.

Learn more about Connect North West, and the vital work that the team do, by visiting connectnw.baby