All hands on deck

I’m back at the maternity ward and it seems there is no end to the stream of women that are in labour today. The labour room can hold about six women at the time, but at 8:30 already we have multiple women sharing beds. Dr. Yvonne and I are called to the delivery room, this night a baby boy has been born with an APGAR score of 4/6, which indicates that the baby is not breathing or moving well. The little baby feels cold; the infrared lamp on top of the changing table is bleeping and showing a system error again. Dr Yvonne shows me how to ventilate and I go to work. “I want to give him a chance until 9:00am, then he has to breathe on his own”, I meet her gaze and we both know it’s a small miracle if this boy is going to do that.

By 9:00am the boy has gone pale and cold, he gasps for air maybe twice a minute at the most. He doesn’t react to stimulations anymore. It’s time to call over the mom to tell her that her firstborn hasn’t made it. She cries silent tears while she walks across the hallway from her room to the delivery room, and only cries for a little bit at her baby’s bedside, seconds later she turns around and walks out of the room. The nurses ask me to wrap the baby tightly in Kangas, the traditional fabric, and lay it on the countertop in the utility room, next to the cleaning bucket and the sink. The changing table has to be cleared again for the next baby.

Another mother walks into the delivery room, the male nurse is assisting her while she climbs up upon the table. I put on sterile gloves, shout “Sukuma, sukuma” and the baby is already there. Crying and kicking, it’s good to see a strong baby for once; the male nurse and I try to clamp the umbilical. He looks at me and says “This was my first delivery”, oh god, this was my first too. Dr Yvonne walks in, she had just been inducing labour in another woman and sees me weighing the baby. She does a double take on the whole situation “oh, I thought that would take longer, the mom was only 5cm dilated half an hour ago.”

The rest of the day Dr. Yvonne and I delivered 4 more babies and scheduled two Caesarean Sections for tomorrow. I didn’t realise it at first, but until now I have not seen one baby girl.

We also have good news, Brian, the handyman from the States has brought some sharpening tools, we can start sharpening the episiotomy scissors at last.