Premature baby charities- which one should I raise money for?!

[JumpingJellyfish]

Hello ladies

Some very kind friends are (again) volunteering to do some fund-raising on behalf of my family - last year raised money for the CF Trust but this year we want to raise money for a premature baby society.

I know Bliss produce booklets and have a support service, so they were initially my first choice, but have also read quite a bit from Tommy's Baby Charity and also Action Medical Research who fund research into premature birth (and pre-eclampsia, which was the reason for both of mine being born early). And there's also a local premature birth support charity- TinyLife- here in NI (where both our DCs were born), who offer support, breast pump loan & are starting to fund research too.

Which charity do you think we should choose? It's so hard as they're all so deserving!

Any opinions very welcome! x

Hi JumpingJellyfish

I have been wondering the same thing, my DS was born prematurely due to me having pre-eclampsia, and we are currently organising his christening & want to ask people to make a charitable donation rather than giving him any christening presents. I think we will end up choosing Bliss as this was the charity that helped us.

Hi JumpingJellyfish

I have been wondering the same thing, my DS was born prematurely due to me having pre-eclampsia, and we are currently organising his christening & want to ask people to make a charitable donation rather than giving him any christening presents. I think we will end up choosing Bliss as this was the charity that helped us.

JJ, good question. it depends whether you feel that supporting a medical research charity or a family support/campaigning charity makes the most difference. My thinking would be that medical charities can apply for funding from a number of sources and don't have to rely on public fundraising, whereas there is no-one else in the space that BLISS occupies. Their messageboards in particular were and are a lifeline for me and the information that they produce is excellent and kept up to date.

Good luck with your choice

Another thing to think about is do you want the money used locally? If you donate to say Bliss and give the money directly to them you have no idea what it will be used for and it won't benefit your local hospital/ Bliss branch. If you want the money to be used locally then donate to the hospital or a local branch.

If donating to the hospital think about what you want the money to be used for, if you give them money for a particular purpose they will use it for that, if you don't it will go into the pot. Might not sound like anything but a couple of people I know wanted to raise money for nursing chairs (they were using the grey plastic ones you had at school) and specified that, if they hadn't the chairs wouldn't have been upgraded because they weren't a priority as far as the hospital was concerned.

Thank you all for your thoughts. It's hard to decide as my two were in two different SCBUs/NICUs in different hospitals, so that's why I'd like to donate to a broader charity than the units themselves. I think at the moment we've decided to go with Bliss, as I did find their information excellent and support very helpful.

Bliss helped me too.

I think that Bliss also fund research too - as well as being a source of information for parents. I could be wrong though.

Bliss do indeed fund research into prematurity.

Have you found your local branch of Bliss? They can give you advice about fundraising and the best way to go about donating.

Hi all,
Bliss do not actually fund research. They do provide support though.

Tommy's does fund research, lots of it. Pre-eclampsia and the placenta are two very high priorities for us. You can read about our research here: www.tommys.org/research. It is categorised by outcome (stillbirth, miscarriage and premature birth) but in fact the underlying causes are often the same (placenta, pre-eclampsia, infection etc). We are in it to make a difference in the long term. Please check out our website to read more.
The team at Tommy's