Babies ventures into cyberspace

Saturday, Nov. 29, 1997 | 11:04 a.m.

Digital snapshots of baby girls and boys are hanging in Columbia Sunrise MountainView Hospital's website, allowing computer-savvy grandparents and friends in faraway places to see the newborns hours after they've made their way into the outer world.

Newborn mug shots stay up for at least a month.

The hospital's baby page, which has been Internet accessible since Oct. 7, has received 2,000 hits. Family and friends have pulled up the snapshots of some babies 200 times; others are pulled up as few as 14 times.

"It all depends on the parents. If they're excited about the Internet and having their babies on the Internet, they'll spread the word," said Cindy Speer, manager of women's services at MountainView.

"We have some parents who just love the idea. Believe it or not, we've had some moms decide to deliver here because they've heard about our web babies."

Ms. Speer said Friday half of the hospital's new mothers choose to put their babies' pictures on the Internet, which is done only with their consent.

Many of those who decline the free service do so because of privacy concerns, Ms. Speer said.

But she said disseminating newborn information on the Internet poses no greater a threat to a family's privacy than having a birth announcement placed in the newspaper.

Ms. Speer said no traceable information is included on the hospital's Web site. Only the first names of parents and babies are used. Also included are the time and day of birth as well as the baby's weight and length.

The architect behind Southern Nevada's first web page for newborns is Rick Dahl, an X-ray specialist who for more than a year had been urging the hospital to put newborn photographs, job postings and general information on the Internet.

Once Ms. Speer or one of her staff members takes a newborn's picture with the digital camera, it takes 15 minutes to get that information on the Web, Dahl said.

Dahl sees Internet baby pages as a wave of the future.

"I would bet by the end of next year, every hospital in town will have a website with web babies," Dahl said.

--- The hospital's website is http://www.MountainView-hospital.com.