OCTUPLETS BORN to a California mother are doing “very, very well” and breathing on their own hours after a delivery lasting just five minutes, doctors said yesterday.
Two of the eight babies, only the second set of octuplets ever born alive in the United States, were initially put on a ventilator after they were delivered on Monday but their breathing tubes were removed yesterday morning.
“Only three babies need some sort of oxygen through the nose right now but they are breathing on their own,” said Dr Mandhir Gupta of Kaiser Permanente Bellflower Medical Center outside Los Angeles.
“The babies are doing actually very, very well.” Doctors were expecting only seven babies and were surprised when they found an eighth after performing a Caesarean section on the mother, who has not been named. The six boys and two girls, identified by doctors by the letters A to H, weighed between 1lb 8oz and 3lbs 4oz but most were about 2lbs.
“We had plans for seven babies,” Dr Karen Maples, one of 46 doctors, nurses and other hospital staff who assisted at the delivery, told reporters yesterday.
“Then we found Baby H. My eyes got to be the size of saucers. We just went on and delivered the babies.” Doctors had rehearsed the deliveries numerous times and were well prepared for Monday’s operation. Four delivery rooms were set aside for the seven babies they expected.
“The orchestrated delivery went off without a hitch,” said Dr Harold Henry, head of maternal and foetal medicine at the hospital “It is quite easy to miss a baby when you’re anticipating seven babies. We’re counting [umbilical] cords and lo and behold, there was another one. Ultrasound doesn’t show you everything.”
The mother was almost 23 weeks pregnant when she checked into the hospital and gave birth to the babies seven weeks later.
The world’s first live octuplets were born in March 1967 in Mexico City, but all died within 14 hours.
Ten years ago, a set of octuplets were born alive in Houston, Texas, and all but one survived.
The mother of the latest octuplets, who has asked not to be identified, is expected to leave hospital next week and she has told doctors she wants to breastfeed all eight babies. Multiple births are usually the result of fertility treatment but doctors declined to discuss the method of conception in the California case.