Born at 24 weeks, weighing 520gm, baby beats odds to survive

UDAIPUR: Baby Maya’s tale of survival is extraordinary. She is the smallest and lightest premature baby to have survived in Rajasthan.

Maya, a micro-preemie baby-- a premature baby, who is born weighing less than 800 gm or before 26 weeks gestation--was in the 24th weeks of gestation, weighing 520 gm, fought for three-and-half months to survive at the neonatal intensive care unit (ICU) at the Jivanta Children’s Hospital in Udaipur.

Born to Maya and Dev Singh (name changed) from Haryana’s Narnaul. The mother went into premature labour and started leaking amniotic fluid at 24 weeks of her pregnancy and was rushed to Udaipur for emergency caesarean section.

Twin babies were born, one weighing 520 gm and the other 480gm on 29th May.

The new born need artificial breathing support to survive and were admitted the neonatal ICU.

The baby weighing 480gm had major brain hemorrhage shortly after birth and died after few days, said Dr Sunil Janged, director and chief neonatologist at the hospital.

“To salvage baby of this size is mammoth task and big challenge,” he said.

“Only 30% of such babies survive and most doctors do not even attempt to save such babies as survival rate is low.”

Dr Pradeep Suryawanshi, a senior neonatologist said micro-preemie babies have extremely poor function of body organs, including the lungs, heart, brain, kidney, skin, and intestine and need artificial support for survival.

In the beginning, the baby was struggling to breathe, so we put her on ventilator and as she had infection in blood—her haemoglobin level was very low at birth—we gave her blood transfusions, said Janged, who supervised the treatment of the baby.

During her 102-day at the neonatal ICU, the baby gained weight and on discharge she weighed 1.71 kg, Janged said.