Nurses hold adorable graduation ceremonies for premature babies leaving NICU

A North Carolina hospital has captured adorable ‘graduation’ photos of premature babies leaving its neonatal intensive care unit (NICU).

Each tiny baby receives a personalised graduation hat when they are healthy and strong enough to leave the unit, which feature the wonderful message: “X days behind me, a whole lifetime in front of me.”

The graduation ceremonies were organised by kind-hearted staff at the CaroMont Regional Medical Centre’s Birthplace facility.

Families also receive a free photo portrait of their baby on ‘graduation day’ courtesy of Bella Baby Photography.

Neonatal nurse Melissa Jordan told BuzzFeed Health said leaving the NICU can be “joyful but also scary”, adding: “So this was our way of bringing a little normalcy to taking the baby home”.

She added: “When I started the program, I called Bella Baby Photography – they take pictures of all our babies going home – and asked if they could come photograph the NICU grads, and the photographer actually offered to give these pictures to the parents free of charge.”