Mother's angst spawns preemie pillow business

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Yamile Jackson's son was born three months premature, weighing less than two pounds. Leaving him in an incubator every night caused her so much stress, she designed a solution: a pillow shaped like a human hand.

"My main concern was that he not feel alone," said the 43-year-old Jackson. "They could see on the monitors how it helped him. What they couldn't see was how it helped me - it lowered my anxiety."

Nearly a decade later, the Zaky - named after her son Zachary, now nine years old and healthy - has been adopted by 300 hospitals in the United States and abroad. Some 17,000 are slated for production this year and Jackson expects her Houston, Texas-based company will likely need more.

Drawing on her background as an industrial engineer, she developed the first Zaky using an ordinary cotton garden glove stuffed with beading, purchased at an arts and crafts store. She slept with the funny-looking creation, infusing it with her body's scent to help calm her infant when she wasn't there.

"I'm Colombian and we touch for everything," said Jackson, who came to the U.S. when she was 21. She recalled her frustration over handling her baby while he was hooked up to monitors and tubes. "I couldn't imagine giving Zachary a life without enjoying human touch."

Jackson worked with the nurses at the hospital's neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) to position the special glove next to her son, mimicking the contained feeling he enjoyed when cradled to her chest. During those moments, the baby was able to rest comfortably.

INCUBATING A BUSINESS

Dr. Fernando Moya, who delivered Jackson's son, has watched the evolution of the Zaky from its onset.

"We saw that it was incredibly useful," said Moya, former director of the Division of Neonatal-Perinatal Medicine at the University of Texas Medical School at Houston. "There's been increasing knowledge that these infants need a set of boundaries."

About 12 percent of babies born in the U.S. every year are premature (less than 37 weeks old), according to the National Institutes of Health. And the care for those preemies costs as much as $26 billion annually, according to a 2006 report by the National Academy of Sciences.

When Jackson finally took her baby home after five months in the NICU, she began getting calls from nurses at Memorial Hermann Hospital in Houston where Zachary was born. They wanted her to make more of the weighted, positioning pillows for use with other preemies.

With the help of her mother, she set to work hand-producing 100 more, using off-the-shelf materials. She soon began working on refinements such as ideal size, weight and temperature, beginning a three-year research and development process.

The Zaky now comes in left- and right-hand models, and is recommended for use in pairs for reasons such as offering babies a more complete feeling of enclosure. The product has been extended to elbow length, measuring 48 centimeters, and is made with antimicrobial, washable materials that retain heat.

The bulk of orders go to hospitals, but the Zaky (www.zakeez.com) also retails in specialty stores and online for $49.95. Sales were up 40 percent in 2010, said Jackson, who gave up a consulting practice in 2007 to focus on the business full time.

COMPETITIVE SPACE

Even so, the Zaky appears to face ample competition. Susie Rosenberg, a nurse specializing in neonatal care at Chicago's Northwestern Memorial hospital's NICU, said she has witnessed a variety of other preemie-positioning devices come to market in recent years. And nurses often create their own solutions, using towels, blankets and other readily available items, depending on the size of the baby.

"They all have the same goal in mind, to facilitate containment and security for a baby, an environment that is as close as possible to the womb," she said, adding that often parents are coming up with new ideas, based on their experiences - things they didn't have while they were there.

Jackson remains eager to tell the very personal history of the Zaky, spending much of her time traveling to tradeshows and distant NICUs, many outside the U.S. She recently changed the name of the company from Zakeez Inc to Nurtured by Design, in part to accommodate the introduction of new products such as the Kangaroo Zak, a top that aids parents in carrying infants against their skin.

Her mission comes down a simple philosophy, rooted in her Colombian upbringing.

"You don't leave anyone alone in a hospital," she said.