SUM Neonatologists Nurse 500 Gram Baby to Good Health

Bhubaneswar: Neonatologists at the Institute of Medical Sciences and SUM Hospital have performed a near miracle by nursing a tiny little baby, weighing just over 500 grams at birth, to good health over the last two years.

The premature baby, who was born on May 23, 2018, weighed only 505 gram at birth and had to be put in the neo-natal ICU where the doctors looked after her for nearly six months.

“She was the tiniest baby I had seen and inquiries revealed that she held the record of being the baby with lowest birth weight born after 25 weeks of pregnancy in Odisha,” Dr. Jagadish Prasad Sahoo, Head of the Superspecialty Department of Neonatology in the hospital, said.
Dr. Sahoo said it was also the first case that a baby of such low birth weight had survived and her health condition improved. Her mother, who had multiple health complications including chronic renal problem, very high blood pressure, diabetes and hypothyroid, had suffered five miscarriages before the birth of this baby born only after 25 weeks of conception. “Her birth was a very complex affair for the gynaecologists as well,” he said.

The baby was born after 16 years of marriage of her parents. Christened Sai Sampurna, she was under constant monitoring of the neonatologists of the hospital and was now in good health.

“Babies of such low birth weight, even if they survive, don’t register proper physical and mental growth. But in case of Sai Sampurna, she has been developing well,” Dr. Sahoo, who led the team of neonatologists, said.

“We are grateful to the team of doctors and nurses who took such great care of our daughter and nursed her to health,” the baby’s father said.

The neonatologist team, which included Dr. Debasish Nanda, Dr. Ratan Das, Dr. Bhagirathi Mallick, Dr. Rosalin Rout, Dr. Payal Pradhan and Dr. Binit Panigrahi besides nurses Dipti, Bishnu, Kabita and Madhu had been taking care of the baby. Good care and treatment enabled the baby to go home from the hospital.

“We have been celebrating her birthday in the NICU over the last two years,” Dr. Sahoo said.