A whopping $35,000 has been raised at the Royal Hobart Hospital Research Foundation’s annual Easter egg hunt, with funds going towards developing new breathing monitors for premature babies.
Around 2,500 people attended Sunday’s event, which was held on Government House instead of its usual location at the Royal Tasmanian Botanical Gardens due to renovations.
Stephanie Furler, CEO of the Royal Hobart Hospital Research Foundation, said the format had been changed from previous years to ensure fairness.
“A few years ago we had a mad scramble where eggs were going everywhere and the older kids were getting too many eggs and the younger kids were missing out,” Furler said.
“This year’s a little bit different. We’ve got a set of clues on the back of the clue sheet that kids can get, and they can find little metal animals around the gardens.”
The new approach helped distribute the 700 kilograms of chocolate more evenly among participants, with around 1,500 bags of eggs prepared for children who completed the hunt.
Funds raised will support research into specialised breathing monitors for premature infants.
“These new sensors will help the doctors keep an eye on their breath and make sure that they keep breathing when they’re so small,” Furler said.
Current monitoring equipment isn’t specifically designed for babies born earlier than 30 weeks gestation, potentially missing dangerous breathing interruptions.
“If that’s not picked up on, there’s obviously some long-term effects for the baby.”
“If we’re able to have early intervention and keep them breathing and monitor that, it absolutely has really fantastic outcomes for the long term.”
