DEMOPOLIS &045; The first baby born at Bryan W. Whitfield Memorial Hospital in 2007 was born at 2:31 a.m. Jan. 1.

LaJames Kindell Sanders was born weighing six pounds and 19-inches long to parents Kimberly Lewis and James Sanders of Dixons Mills. Lewis said that she was told that the child would be a girl up for the largest part of her pregnancy.

Lewis said she had two other boys, Keshaw Fountain, 4, and Jacquan Fountain, 3, but she said she isn’t disappointed that it turned out she was having another. Lewis was presented with an assortment of donations for the child through the hospital’s HealthStart program for the baby being the first newborn of 2007.

Marcia Lankster is the division director of Grants, Research and Outreach of West Alabama, which includes HealthStart, and she says that the HealthStart program is geared toward maternity so the New Year’s baby is a way to give back. She said that the program received donations form 59 different businesses, and they received cash donations to pay for a bassinette, bassinette sheets, walker, digital thermometer, infant rattle and 40 gallons of nursery water for the baby.

The HealthStart program itself has been providing maternity services for Medicaid beneficiaries for over 10 years said Lankster. She said the program has helped lower infant morality rates in the Marengo, Choctaw and Sumter Counties since initiated in 1992.

Lankster said that HealthStart is one of the many programs that Grants, Research and Outreach of West Alabama promotes. She said that the group’s mission was to promote, support and influence a comprehensive approach to the innovative integration of persons and technology into the healthcare organization and surrounding communities through collaboration and commitment.