Unit welcomes battling babies

Helen Tuimavave with her baby Clarah, at Waitakere Hospital's new special-care baby unit yesterday. Picture / Brett Phibbs

Clarah Tuimavave-Gerrard lies sleeping in her cot, a mass of black hair frames her tiny face and her long black eyelashes flicker as a nurse removes the special cover that keeps out the light.

The Glen Eden baby was the first to be transferred to Waitakere Hospital's new special-care baby unit and by the end of opening day yesterday, another five premature or sick infants were booked to join her.

Clarah, who spent the first 16 days of her life at National Women's Health at Auckland City Hospital, was a "surprise" home birth arriving four days before her due date and just as mum, Helen, was about to head to hospital.

But Clarah, weighing in at 4.02kg, wasn't breathing. A St John's Ambulance crew who arrived in time for the birth gave her oxygen before she was transferred to Auckland and placed on a ventilator.

Since then Ms Tuimavave her partner and her family have made daily visits to Auckland City Hospital, juggling the care of her two other children.

"I would be there the whole day and go home to sleep. Now it takes me five or 10 minutes to get here compared with 45 minutes in the morning," she said.

"I can go home and do things during the day and come back in time for her feeds."

Ms Tuimavave said life since Clarah arrived had been a "roller-coaster ride".

Although she no longer needed a ventilator, she was fed through a tube in her nose and her prognosis was uncertain.

"It's one day at a time. She's doing much better. Hopefully she will be off the tube feeding, on the breast and then home."

The special-care baby unit, part of a $60 million makeover of Waitakere Hospital, will take babies born as early as 32 weeks' gestation and as small as 1500g, who need neonatal support.

Unit manager Donna Neal said full-term babies, who unexpectedly became unwell during birth or those born with congenital abnormalities or diabetes, would also be cared for in the eight-cot unit.

Babies who needed intensive care or those born before 32 weeks would be cared for at Auckland City Hospital and later transferred back to Waitakere.

Eventually the unit would have 12 cots, bringing the total for the Auckland region to 100 when Middlemore's new unit, on which work starts today, was completed.