3 days after giving birth to our second child Guillermo Jose or "Guijo", we were discharged from Makati Medical Center. It was Monday, 22nd of August 2011, and we were simply overjoyed. He was an easy baby to care for and we quickly established our feeding routine. A week later on August 29, we noticed a change in his demeanor - he was lethargic and didn't want to feed. After a quick call to my sis-in-law Dr. Winnie Carsi Cruz Cruda, a pediatrician, we were adviced to seek medical attention.
Apparently, with neonates, or newborns, symptoms can be very subtle, so it's best not to leave things to chance. An infection that is left undetected may spread to the blood so parents must act fast. I found myself very worried at how limp he felt in my arms, at how unresponsive he was - he wouldn't cry or even offer a feeble grunt in protest when his nappy was changed. He clamped his mouth shut and wouldn't feed. I knew that breast feeding created an opportunity for an infant's immune system to plug into its mother's more mature system - I could provide some protection for Guijo by sharing some of my antibodies with him and helping him fight an infection - but this can only happen if he actually feeds from me! Those two symptoms - unresponsiveness and poor feeding were enough red flags.
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| Guijo undergoing phototherapy for jaundice at St. Luke's. |
FROM OUR HOME TO ST. LUKE'S
My husband Oliver suggested we go to St. Luke's Medical Center at the Global City in Fort Bonifacio. While I was happy with the quality of care at Makati Med, it was not very convenient in terms of location, due to the traffic, and parking issues (no overnight parking for instance). The E.R. was simply heaven! The pediatric section of the E.R. was spacious, and secluded, and squeaky clean. But as hospital policy goes, a baby as young as Guijo had to be confined at the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit or NICU. We left Guijo at the NICU at around 3 am, and we returned a few hours later to meet with our doctor. A lot of tests were administered to diagnose Guijo, and we had to wait for results. In the meantime, he underwent phototherapy for jaundice. He was yellowish when we took him to the hospital. Another suspect was a discharge found in his cord stump. Tests determined that there was indeed an infection and we needed to rule out (or anticipate and treat for) the possibility of sepsis. This meant waiting for more conclusive results from the blood culture test, which takes several days. Our doctor told us Guijo had to complete a course of antibiotics which lasts for 7 days. Whether sepsis was confirmed or not, we had to follow standard protocols, act conservatively, and start with treatment.
When we found out we had to stay for such a long time we asked if we can take Guijo out of the NICU and have him complete his course of antibiotics in a regular hospital room where I can stay with him and breastfeed conveniently. As it was, I was going back and forth from my house to the hospital, even in the wee hours of the morning, to breastfeed Guijo, and since I had just given birth, the arrangement was taking its toll on me. I was just getting so tired, and it hurt when I walked too far, or sat too long. Our pediatrician was sympathetic to us and was willing to allow us to transfer out of the NICU, but hospital policy prevented us from doing so. Oliver advised me to look for a hospital which has a different policy, one that would allow rooming-in with our baby. We found out The Medical City in Ortigas would allow such an arrangement, and so we started processing our discharge from St. Luke's.
FROM ST. LUKE'S TO MEDICAL CITY
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| Out of the NICU and in a regular room at Medical City. The family gets to visit Guijo in comfort. |
We felt confident that Guijo could already be moved out of the NICU, and out of St. Luke's because of encouraging improvements in his condition. He gained weight, his skin color looked good, he screamed loudly when hungry, and gave grown-up-sized burps when full. Our pediatrician at St. Luke's, Dr. Ruth Valeriano, was super helpful. She wrote detailed information I could give to the receiving staff at Medical City. So on Sept. 1, after 3 days at St. Luke's, we moved Guijo out of the NICU a little after lunch time.
By 2 pm, we were at Medical City's E.R. and I was in for a shock - the place was packed with sick people, and the pediatric ward, in particular, seemed bursting at the seams with worried parents rushing their kids to the E.R. because of a widespread dengue scare. The situation at their E.R. was in stark contrast to the heavenly seclusion we enjoyed at St. Luke's. I became very worried for my fragile 2-week old son. The E.R. was full because the rooms in the hospital's pediatric floor were all full as well, and there was a long waiting list to get one. Some of the parents I talked to told me they have been at the E.R. for quite a while, some have been there since dawn, and one parent claimed they've been there since the previous night. Scared by their stories, I found myself requesting the nurse to admit Guijo to the NICU! What irony! We took him to Medical City because we wanted him out of the NICU, and we find ourselves requesting to be returned to the NICU! I just wanted to get out of that congested E.R. as soon as possible and reduce Guijo's exposure.
So Guijo was admitted in the NICU and we had ourselves wait-listed for a regular room. By 8 pm, we received news that a room had become available in a non-pediatric floor, and since our pediatrician specified that we must be on the pediatric floor, we had to wait some more. Fortunately by 10 pm, we already had a room on the pediatric floor, we just had to wait for Guijo to be brought to us from the NICU. After a long day of dealing with hospital procedures, it was sheer bliss to finally get to lie down and rest and have my baby in the room with me.
The next few days went by quickly. Guijo was already better and we were just waiting for the course of antibiotics to be completed. His meds had to be administered to him via an IV drip so he couldn't move around to much and needed to be under constant monitoring by nurses, but other than the discomfort of the heplock attached to him, Guijo was in perfect form. The hospital stay gave me a chance to rest and recover as well. As I was tasked to watch Guijo the whole time, I had a chance to focus only on caring for him, feeding-nappy change-burping-bathing. It was a blessing that my parents offered to watch my eldest child Narra, whom I love dearly, but whose energy level I could not yet keep up with given my sleepless state and post-labor aches and pains.
On September 5, Monday, 2 weeks after we brought him home from Makati Med, we brought him home again this time from Medical City, with a clean bill of health! 3 weeks and 3 hospitals...it's been quite a ride. Seeing Guijo healthy though, is worth all the effort.
Related Posts:
Enjoyable Delivery at Makati Medical Center
http://nikki-mama.blogspot.com/2011/09/enjoyable-delivery-at-makati-medical.html
A Simple Celebration of Baby's First Birthday
http://nikki-mama.blogspot.com/2011/09/simple-celebration-of-babys-1st-month.html
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