Little AJ is three months old and starting to find his giggling voice. To new mom Liz, it’s the most joyful sound, since just a few months ago, that little voice, even his cry, was silent while a ventilator took over his breathing.
When AJ was born full term at the Rockyview Hospital, he developed meconium aspiration syndrome – he inhaled the meconium, or baby’s first poop, in the amniotic fluid as he was being delivered. The meconium coated his lungs, causing him to struggle to breathe. He was on Liz’s chest for 30 seconds, before doctors whisked him away to that hospital’s Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU). There, he was intubated – a breathing tube inserted into his airway and hooked up to a ventilator to breathe for him. When he was stabilized, he was transferred to the Alberta Children’s Hospital’s Edward Family Neonatal Intensive Care Unit for pediatric critical care.
For the next five days, AJ remained intubated in the NICU. While sad to see a machine taking over his breathing, and not hearing him make noise or cry for days, Liz and husband Matt stayed by his side while specialists kept close watch over him. In addition to providing him breathing support, and suctioning of the meconium from his lungs, his team monitored his brain as well due to the oxygen he lost at birth by way of a cooling blanket, funded by donors, that dropped his body temperature to help preserve brain function.
Liz says the NICU team not only cared for her baby boy but supported her and Matt too. By involving them in his care and daily routines, including diaper changes, Liz says the “the silver lining with staying in the NICU, is they taught us how to be parents.” He graduated from a ventilator to CPAP machine, and then low-flow oxygen through nasal prongs for his breathing support. A week into his care, Liz was finally able to hold her baby again and breastfeed him. After 2 ½ weeks in the NICU, Liz and Matt happily took their baby home. Today he is a smiley baby who is learning to roll and kick his legs.
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Liz says she can’t put into words how thankful she and Matt are to their team at the NICU for the care they provided their son and for donors who support technology like ventilators for the NICU that helped keep her baby alive and grow stronger. It’s why they are grateful to be able to share their story as part of this Equipment Power Hour to help the NICU acquire a new ventilator to help save more babies’ lives.
