New equipment will help premature babies
Funding for a special incubator will mean better care for infants born too soon
James Goldie
Northern News Services
Tuesday, September 9, 2015
SOMBA K'E/YELLOWKNIFE
Enhanced care will soon be available for premature babies in Yellowknife thanks to a new piece of equipment coming soon to the hospital's pediatrics unit.
Heather Warner and Dr. Darcy Scott outside the nursery at Staton Territorial Hospital. Expanding the neonatal intensive care services available here will allow require more equipment like the new incubator that was recently ordered. - James Goldie/NNSL photo
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Stanton Territorial Hospital is in the process of ordering a $50,000 Giraffe Incubator -- a piece of equipment that allows doctors to perform minor procedures on babies born prematurely, without removing them from the heat source that is so critical to their survival.
"It's one of those things where when you need it, you really need it and there aren't a lot of other options," said pediatrition Dr. Darcy Scott.
Approximately 50 out of 615 births across the territory last year required neonatal services. Premature babies in the Northwest Territories are transferred to Edmonton for care, however, the first hours after birth are among the most important. Until they can be flown out, these babies are kept in an incubator, which is effectively a special box that allows doctors to regulate a baby's warmth, moisture and exposure to light.
"All those things need to be done in an incubator but then you can't get at them," said Scott. In order for doctors to perform even basic tasks like shifting a baby's position or putting in IVs, the baby must be removed from the incubator and put on a separate bed underneath an overhead heat lamp.
"So (the Giraffe Incubator) is sort of a one-stop shop to be able to do both at once," said Scott. The incubator's four walls can be lowered and its ceiling raised up and switched into an over-bed heater while doctors perform any necessary procedures.
Heather Warner, acting manager of pediatrics and obstetrics at Stanton, acknowledged that the equipment's name might have some people thinking of zoos rather than hospitals.
"They (the manufacturer) tend to name their warmers and incubators after animals," she said, because it gives them more of a pediatric-friendly feel.
She does not yet have a date confirmed for when the incubator will arrive.
"All I know is we got the wonderful foundation cheque," she said. The equipment still has to be ordered and then set up. "No exact date, but cross our fingers (that will be) soon."
Funding for the incubator was made possible by the Stanton Territorial Hospital Foundation and the Sandra Schmirler Foundation. The latter donates resources towards neonatal care across Canada, and is named in honour of a Canadian world curling champion and Olympian who died of cancer in 2000.
Yellowknifer Kerry Galusha is a renowned Canadian curler with ties to the Sandra Schmirler Foundation, having volunteered with fundraising telethons at the annual Canadian women's curling championship. She has also participated in the Kurl for Kids charity event in Toronto three times, with proceeds going to the foundation.
Galusha was pleasantly surprised when she learned of this year's donation to the Stanton Territorial Hospital.
"That was just really amazing because I've helped fundraise and people from the north have donated," she said. "So it's really cool that some of that money is going to come back to us."
The Yellowknife curling community is equally pleased.
"(For them) it's like, 'Wow, my money has actually gone to support the north and not just southern hospitals,'" she said.
