I had my baby at 27 weeks, 13 weeks early, at 2.5 pounds after a hospitalization at 25 weeks. After basically living at the hospital for months, I have a pretty great insight into how it runs.
Nobody expects to have a premature baby. Parents always imagine making it to forty weeks, having a healthy baby, and leaving the hospital within a few days. However, according to the World Health Organization, one in ten babies is born premature, which means it happens a lot more often than one might think.
And when it does happen, you want to be in the right place. And for us, that was Mott’s Children’s Hospital under the umbrella of the University of Michigan Health.
When you give birth at the hospital, and your child is preterm or full term with complications, they will take your baby straight to the eighth floor. There, your baby will start on any medications necessary for your particular case, and usually breathing support.
There are multiple types of breathing supports available depending on what your baby needs. They could be ventilated, end up on CPAP, or have a cannula. In more extreme cases, your baby might need a tracheostomy, but this is rarer.
If you’re staying in the hospital post birth, you can walk downstairs to the eighth floor as often as you want, other than times when your nurse needs you for checks and medication. Once you are discharged, you’ll have 24/7 access to your baby. You’re welcome to sleep in the NICU or go home, whatever is better for your mental health.
If you live far away, you might qualify to stay in the Ronald McDonald house, which is attached to the hospital. Other visitors can come as well, as long as you don’t have more than four visitors at a time, and anyone who isn’t a parent has to stick to visiting hours, which are from 9am to 9am.
RELATED: Introducing the Innovator Behind Mott’s New Technology for Kids
The primary role of the NICU is to help your baby grow. At this particular NICU, you have to pass a few tests to get discharged. A young preemie needs to learn how to regulate their temperature, breathe on their own, work past events (such as oxygen or heart rate levels dropping), learn to feed, and gain weight.
Your baby will be hooked up to monitors that show their heart rate, oxygen level and respiratory rate. If anything drops, they will beep and alert the nurses.
This particular NICU
So what makes this particular NICU so special? First and foremost, it’s a Level Four NICU, which means they can take preemies born earlier and who are dealing with more complicated issues. Their website states, “Infants in the NICU receive expert care from board-certified neonatologists and pediatric subspecialists, many of whom are respected internationally as authorities on neonatal ventilatory support and other newborn therapies.”
They also care for parents here. There is a tea cart that comes by twice a day to offer food, coffee and tea in case you’re hungry. There are events all year long that are for both parents and their child. During holidays, they’ll provide meals.
They even have an entire store set up on the eighth floor that is donated to the hospital in December to let you pick out gifts for your infant for free. And your nurses will give you little decorations to represent milestones that have your baby’s feet and handprints on them, which is an adorable keepsake.
Day to day, the NICU can get monotonous if your child is doing well, but the doctors will tell you that boring is better. Every day you’ll have rounds, which is when a group of doctors, specialists and nurse practitioners will stop by, discuss your child’s case, and make any changes necessary. This could be weaning respiratory support, starting feeds, labwork or more. If your child has any complications, you might have multiple rounds for a specific team, such as neurology.
General care
The NICU team also has some guidelines that they follow. For example, if your child has blood in their stool, they’ll do something called a NEC workup, where they take your child off feeds to make sure they don’t have an infection. Your child will also get cranial ultrasounds and eye exams during their stay because vision issues and brain bleeds are more common in preemies than full-term babies.
Another great thing about the hospital is that you can be as involved as you want to be. They will let you change your baby’s diaper, take their temperature, participate in rounds, and feed your baby. If you become close to a nurse and trust them, you can ask them to be your primary, which means they will get first dibs at a shift with your baby over other nurses.
Having a baby early can be terrifying, but this hospital will take care of your family and make sure that you and your child are getting the best care possible. And when you can trust your doctors and nurses, you’ll be in a healthier place to take care of yourself and your family.
