CARE FOR THE TINIEST OF PATIENTS J yotsna was just 24 weeks along in her pregnancy when her water broke. Her husband, Ujjwal, drove her to Overlake, where tiny Vamika was delivered. She weighed only 1 pound, 6 ounces. “We didn’t know much about caring for a premature baby and were so thankful that we were at Overlake so she didn’t need to be transferred to another hospital,” Jyotsna remembers. With the support of our generous community, Overlake’s Level III Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) is able to care for babies as young as 24 weeks of gestational age—like Vamika.
To support Vamika during her four- month stay, the NICU nurses taught Jyotsna the importance of providing skin-to-skin care daily, holding tiny Vamika against her chest to comfort her. Skin-to-skin care has been shown to help babies sleep and eat better and results in higher oxygen levels and weight gain. “Every day, my husband or I went to the NICU to hold Vamika,” Jyotsna says. “The nurses were so supportive and took the time to address all of our questions and concerns.” A life-saving treatment known as surfactant replacement therapy was given through a breathing tube, which helped coat Vamika’s lungs and improve pulmonary function. Because she didn’t have the strength to suck, Vamika received nourishment through a thin tube, known as a nasogastric tube, which is threaded through her nose, down the back of her throat to her stomach, delivering the breast milk Jyotsna pumped each day.
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