Moving the Tiniest Patients

WASHINGTON (AP) - 14 week-old Morgan Bryant arrived at Children's National Medical Center in Northwest, "weighing one pound, 11.9 ounces," according to her mother Modelia. "She was premature; she was born at 25 weeks, so it was very scary."

With the help of nearly 100 doctors and nurses, Morgan became one of the first babies to move into the hospital's brand new, state of the art neonatal intensive care unit this weekend.

Called the NICU, the new floor will treat the smallest, and sickest,
newborns transferred from more than 40 hospitals in the Washington area. It is the only Level III C rated NICU in the region, which is the highest level available.

"Whenever you are starting in a new facility, there is some trepidation that everything will work perfectly," says Dr. David Wessel.

Wessel says the hospital spent weeks testing all of the new equipment and practicing for the big move. "I am happy to say everything is cooperating beautifully today," he says.

"For these families, this is a crisis in what otherwise should have been a normal welcoming of a new baby in their lives," says Nurse Linda Talley. She says the NICU nurses spent more than three years helping to design the new floor.

According to Talley, instead of a traditional "nurses station,"
everything is now decentralized, which allows the nurses to stay near each baby's bedside.

And every baby has its own, private suite with a refrigerator for breast milk and a super-comfy sleeper-chair for parents.

That is what has Talley, Dr. Wessel and nearly everyone else on the new floor so excited.

Talley says "the opportunity to provide privacy in the form of private rooms is really extraordinary; it is state of the art." She says in the old NICU, where many babies shared the same space, there wasn't much privacy. As a result, nurses had to pull parents away from their children in order to deliver difficult news. "Now, we can do that with the whole family unit by the bedside."

Modelia Bryant says the private suites really do make a difference.
"It's the privacy, its a lot more quiet, peaceful, you have you're own
personal time with your baby."

But as nice as Morgan's new room is, her mother says they can't wait until they get a chance to leave.

"It's gorgeous, but we would just rather be home."