Hospital Baby Blankets

Specialties Ob/Gyn

Published

I was watching a documentary on ESPN and the wife of an NBA player was at home holding her new child wrapped in what is clearly one of those hospital baby blankets. You know the ones that every baby is wrapped in: white with pink and blue block stripes. My question: are those supposed to be taken or do people just steal from the hospital? I know my neighbors just had their second baby and they would take diapers and wipes every time a new nurse or CNA walked in the room. They kept saying they were out and needed more. Seems like a lot of money may be lost in this way for the hospital.

All that money that they pay the hospital, I am sure those patients deserve more than a free blanket lol. Those blankets are not made out of diamond, just cheap cotton. I am sure most parents to be have been shopping and they would prefer to use their own pretty blankets. What bothers me the most is the formula, I swear one lady had 3O or more formula bottles in the room and kept asking for more.

At my hospital formula is charged to the patient.

Specializes in Med-Surg.

Well a lot of units have scanners, or stickers, for each item to be charged to that patient.

Sometimes we send the blanket home if the patient has a pet, so they can smell the infant. A lot of the service/no insurance patients take as many blankets/diapers/formula/wipes they can get their hands on so they do not have to buy anything later. Sometimes the infant is too small for the car seat, so we trifold a blanket to support the head. It is frustrating sometimes because every time I see someone steal a blanket, I think, "There goes more of my Christmas bonus."

You can buy them in packs of 12 on ebay and some baby websites. I do foster care (mostly babies and medically fragile children) and have 24 of them that I paid for. They are perfect for swaddling, rolling to support a baby/toddler and they never get stained for some reason. They just get softer and fluffier with each washing.

Well it is necessary to change diaper and wipes again and again for the safety of the kids and for other reasons..But it doesn't mean that you change it again and again,this is just a waste..

I just like the mesh panties they give the moms to wear. My nurse gave me some before I left. They also packed a cheap, black diaper bag for the baby that had diapers, wipes and bottles. I didn't take the blankets though because I knew they reused those.

Specializes in Ante-Intra-Postpartum, Post Gyne.
All that money that they pay the hospital, I am sure those patients deserve more than a free blanket lol. Those blankets are not made out of diamond, just cheap cotton. I am sure most parents to be have been shopping and they would prefer to use their own pretty blankets. What bothers me the most is the formula, I swear one lady had 3O or more formula bottles in the room and kept asking for more.

Most of the patients do not pay a dime. Most of the patients are on state paid insurance. Yes, they are not made out of diamonds, but cheap cotton adds up; along with all the other services that the hospital has to eat because state paid insurance (i.e. Medicaid, Medi-cal) only pay a set price that does not cover all costs. If they are poor and need help we can call social services to help the get set up with programs. It is not the hospitals job to give away "free stuff" they don't get reimbursed for.

Specializes in Nurse Scientist-Research.
All that money that they pay the hospital, I am sure those patients deserve more than a free blanket lol.

I will reiterate what a previous poster just replied, very few of the abusers are actually paying their bills. I am paying their bill, and I am getting no benefit from sending them home with closets full of our blankets.

When one of the babies starts "rooming in", (which is the trial period when the parents stay in one of our rooms for a day to do all cares right before they go home) I limit the blanket/diaper/wipe situation and also only take out the older blankets that are not so pretty & bright (but are perfectly suitable though no one would want them).

And also like a previous poster, we have situations where the parents are good hardworking folks (how dare they!) and make just enough to get shoddy insurance and disqualified for WIC. Those parents get extra bottles/cans of formula from me. One night we were rooming in a child with a chronic condition where the parents didn't qualify for WIC and their child was going home on one of those unusual rare formulas. We had cases of it that we almost never used and they usually went bad on the shelf. The cases were going to expire in about 6 weeks but this child would have used all of it by then. We explained the expiration dates to them and had the dad take those cases out to the car in the middle of the night when the higher ups wouldn't be there to question such a decision.

Unless they're self pay, they aren't paying for what's scanned. Insurance reimburses a set amount for the diagnosis. Insurance is NOT going to pay for 10 extra packs of this, 30 extra bottles of that.

Scanning for most things is just to keep up with inventory.

Specializes in Nurse Scientist-Research.
Unless they're self pay, they aren't paying for what's scanned. .

And really, in most cases self-pay is code for no-pay.

You can buy them in packs of 12 on ebay and some baby websites. I do foster care (mostly babies and medically fragile children) and have 24 of them that I paid for. They are perfect for swaddling, rolling to support a baby/toddler and they never get stained for some reason. They just get softer and fluffier with each washing.
I applaud you for doing foster cafe, However, if packs of blankets are showing up on Ebay, you can bet someone stole them from a hospital linen room!

Speaking as a former nursery nurse...BLANKETS ARE NOT PART OF THE GIVE AWAYS-nor are the baby undershirts with mitts on them(can I just have a few, I can't buy them anywhere) Cant count the number of times we ended up using towels-or cut up bath blankets(I date myself, I know),,,because there were no baby blankets in central supply. I see the OP's mentioned blankets on just about every show on tv...

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