Small great treasures

It seems that everything shines, and the colors and air are no longer important when children reach our lives, our priorities and the way we see things. At that special moment you receive help; neonatal doctors and nurses are there, the first parents.

The intellectual physical development of preterm infants or weighing less than 1,500 grams is a fundamental objective in the Neonatal Services at Iván Portuondo hospital , an experience that progresses satisfactorily in the provincial perinatal center, located in San Antonio de los Baños township.

In addition to the patients from surrounding municipalities, they assist serious condition children and the ones under 1,500 grams (g) throughout the province.

At the moment of writing these lines, there were two patients in Iván Portuondo Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (UCIN): one from Güira de Melena, born at 28 weeks and 1 070 g in weight, and one from Quivicán, in Mayabeque, due to intrauterine growth retardation.

This unit comprises three cubicles, with 14 capacities, distributed in four beds of intensive therapy, equal number of intermediate and nutritional recovery, and six for observation stage.

According to gynecologist Yanet García, head of the Pregnancy Room and president of the Committee of Cesarean, children usually enter due to prematurity, underweight or other serious conditions requiring specialists´attention.

“Some do not have strictly obstetric problems; So we also have a variety of specialists, ranging from endocrinologists to clinicians, “Garcia explains.

Mothers can extract milk and take children in her arms up to three hours, those who are not in incubators, so that they do not lose contact and be aware of their development.

Along with the effort to reduce infant mortality rate, Public Health specialists in the province have a strict control in the care of low- birth- weight children.

“I am very happy: my child was saved thanks to the quickness and effort of intensive care specialists and nurses ; they take care of him with the same love that I would do it if I could. There are reasons to thank them, “says Laura Lopez, mother of one of the babies in the UCIN.

“Attention to newborn babies is excellent. Children admitted in the ward have so many problems that it seems impossible to save them, but the perseverance and devotion of our specialists made that possible. Over time we see them grow strong. It is an unequaled joy. We are Provincial Reference Center for children under 1500 g, “says Odalys Valdés, hospital´s director.

Devote their days to the attention of the newborn babies is a priority for this ward of Neonatology at Iván Portuondo hospital , which also has a ward of Puerperium with 24 beds of accommodation, childbirth romm, operating room and the service Skin to Skin or Child Kangaroo Program , for babies under 1 800 g.

Alternatives that help

Prematurity is one of the causes of low birth weight , and is due to the increase in tension during pregnancy, which in some patients causes this condition for the baby.

As a tactic, they carry out periodic checks in the offices of the Doctor and the Family Nurse, in order to avoid risk factors for preterm birth, and in other cases pregnant women are admitted in the Maternal Home or in the house , in order to guarantee that her pregnancy reaches the established term with the optimal health conditions, both for mother and for future child.

In addition, the Skin-to-Skin Program, with its “kangaroo mother” methodology (consisting of placing the baby in a holder that will keep him at all times in near his mother), is a great help for boys´s right and faster development.

This service, only implemented in San Antonio, began in 2002, with very favorable results.

The Child Kangaroo Program, attached to UCIN, has three beds: it includes all babies who are already in nutritional recovery stage and have surpassed almost three percent of their initial weight.

According to Jorge Alexis Pérez, head of the Neonatology Service and the Provincial Group of the specialty, “up today the hospital has 948 live births. There were four deaths (4.2 per thousand live births in the infant mortality rate); of them, three children under 1 000 grams and one with a congenital malformation, who died almost immediately after birth.

The prognostic and evolution of the patients is favorable, despite an increase in the number of children born with low weight, for one reason or another.

The Skin to Skin service contributes to improving the quality of life of this type of condition in babies, as it does not lose direct contact with the mother , the baby can breastfeed directly and achieve nutritional recovery.

Just by giving them the right attention at the right time, the problem is solved. The beautiful work of specialists and nurses at San Antonio de los Baños´ hospital has made that many families have the privilege of having at home, safe and sound, those small treasures that life gives us: children.

TRANSLATION BY LMMS