So I'm standing out at our front desk talking with the charge nurse about the 32 week triplets that we've been waiting half the night for, when she gets a phone call. I see her face kinda go all pale, eyes get all big, and she says that she'll "be right there". Now I assume that the phone call was from L&D... something about a triplet being out already...
Nope.
The call was from our AP unit. Evidently a Mom who was 28 plus weeks (who was just there for some prolonged monitoring) had felt some gas pains, went to the bathroom, and out dropped baby. Dad actually said that he heard a "thud". Yikes...
So our team rushed up there, brought the baby down... He's doing great so far, on NCPAP +5, 21%. Hopefully his head didn't hit the ground too hard when he fell to the floor...
Now I've heard about babies being born in the toliet, but always term. Anybody else ever had a preterm do this (or something similar)???
In the ER a 19 weeker was born this way. To make matters worse, some management idiot had made the decision to go with automatic flush toilets. You can guess how bad a decision that was. The next day all the bathrooms in the facility were getting new toilets.
Specializes in Level 3 NICU 17 yrs, Neo transport 13 yr.
we have had preemies and term kids born in the toilet/bathroom, but probably more preemies than term. most of these have taken place at home, but on occasion it has happened at the hospital.
In the ER a 19 weeker was born this way. To make matters worse, some management idiot had made the decision to go with automatic flush toilets. You can guess how bad a decision that was. The next day all the bathrooms in the facility were getting new toilets.
Although I guess that as far as the baby was concerned, it wouldn't matter if it was an auto-flush, since it was 19 weeks. Ouch for mom, though!
Just remembered I had a 15-weeker almost deliver in the toilet once. We got her back to the bed in time to deliver there. Ugh. That was a sad, horrible night.
The 'oops' delivery I remember most was a 24 weeker delivered in the bed when mom turned on her side. The baby was delivered in the bag with everything still intact when we got there. After a typical NICU stay, the baby was dc'd home with mom.
I haven't had this happen to me yet when working on our antepartum unit, but I'll make sure to pay attention to "gas pain" a lot closer now!
I came so close one night to a toilet delivery with a term baby - mom was 4cms and SROM in bed...told me she needed to go pee about 5 min. later. Since she had just SROM I told her I didn't want her to walk to BR and walked to the other side of the room to get a bedpan.....walking back with bedpan she says she feels pressure, check her and she's complete +2! Baby was out 2 minutes later.
24 week twins....one born onto the floor of the APU room with a ruptured unbilical cord, the other born in stat c/s. The APU nurse comes running into the NICU holding the baby. The floor twin has a normal head, the c/s twin has a grade IV / grade III !!
:eek:
elizabells, BSN, RN
2,094 Posts
I always wondered why we didn't have automatic toilets to go with our automatic sinks. Now I know...