Summary:
“We regularly get babies at 650g, either at birth or loss of weight after the first day of birth. We still have an average 92% success rate with them. Around 2,000 low birth weight babies were also referred by private hospitals to the CMCH.“While we have 95% survival rate among the 2,500 low birth weight babies in our hospital, we have a survival rate of 90% among the 2,000-odd low birth weight babies referred from other hospitals,” CMCH dean Dr B Ashokan said.“Of the 4,500-odd babies under 1.5kg admitted in the SNICU, at least 150 babies were less than 1kg, again of which more than 30 babies were below 700g at time of admission,” chief pediatrician in the hospital Dr V Bhooma said. The few we lose are those babies who come with sepsis or in the last stage,” she adds.“However, babies are now referred to us from private hospitals, not to make it more affordable for poor patients, but because of the GH’s expertise in dealing with extremely low birth weight babies,” she added.Doctors say they achieve survival rates, much higher than national rates, by offering premature babies “medically extended motherhood” while protecting them from infections. “This includes administering a fluid called Surfactant through tubing directly into a baby’s lungs to help it develop, we put them on ventilator to further help the baby breathe and keep them in incubators to help them maintain the body temperature they enjoyed inside the mother’s womb,” Dr Bhooma said..