Resource for Caregivers of Multiples and/or Premature Infants!
Macy and Mallory were due for their annual eye exams this past week. We really like our eye doctor, but unfortunately his office doesn’t participate with our vision insurance, EyeMed (don’t get me started on my rant about insurance companies dictating what doctors we can and can’t see). Luckily, since the girls have a history of Retinopathy of Prematurity (ROP), our medical insurance (Blue Cross Blue Shield) will cover the exams, and I only have to pay our $25 copay.
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Worldwide, 13 million babies are born preterm each year and one million of those die each year as a result of their early birth. Today (November 17th, 2011) is the first-ever World Prematurity Day, part of the March of Dime’s Prematurity Awareness Month, to honor these premature infants and raise awareness about the importance of striving to give every baby a healthy start in life.
So today, I not only praise the March of Dimes for helping my preemie twins, Macy and Mallory, survive almost eighteen years ago, but I also praise my preemie twins themselves for the fine young ladies they have turned out to be. Read our story.
Macy recently attended the FCCLA Cluster Meeting in Minneapolis and was so excited to tell me that one of the presentations at the convention was the March of Dimes talking about World Prematurity Day. I am hoping she decides to do a Star Project on being a preemie and share her miraculous story.
If you read the story of my preemie twins, you will know that Macy had gallstones (yes, a 6 pound baby had gallstones). Back in 1994, Moctanin was the drug of choice for adults (not children, and especially not babies) to break up gallstones. Moctanin was to be administered slowly over time (again in ADULTS). Well, the nurse gave my daughter an adult dose with one push of a syringe! Macy coded. It took the doctors and residents over 45 minutes to revive her (I read this later in the hospital records). The doctors prepared us that Macy would probably not live through the night. When we saw her, she was gray and lifeless and bleeding out of every orifice (eyes, ears, drainage tubes, etc).
A million questions ran through my mind. Did the pharmacist that dispensed Moctanin warn the doctor and staff of Unsafe Drugs side effects? Why did they think an adult medicine would work on a baby? And why didn’t they decrease the dose? And why wasn’t it administered properly? And why was my least favorite resident (he wore a huge turban and spoke very poor English) assigned to Macy’s care?
Moctanin was eventually taken off the market, and Macy lived to tell her story, bless her heart!
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