A new operating room for NICU babies

When a baby from the Newborn Intensive Care Unit needs surgery, every step is critical.

Previously, when one of these babies needed surgery, they had to be transported from the NICU to the operating room across the hospital, a long and sometimes difficult trek that required extra care for our tiny patients.

“The NICU had been challenged to find ways to keep babies with very small birthweights warm while transporting to the main OR,” said Pat Brown, manager of Pediatrics. “We would transport the babies in incubators or warmers and used warm blankets and warm fluid placed around the baby’s body, but nothing is as good as having the OR and NICU next to each other.”

To create a safer environment and to ease the minds of already worried parents, TMC opened a special operating room right across the hall from the NICU. This operating room is outfitted with all the state-of-the-art equipment a NICU baby requires during surgery including a specific bed, anesthesia machine, warmer and ventilator.

“It has made such a big difference for these babies and their families,” said pediatric surgeon Catherine Cosentino, M.D. “They go right across the hallway to have their operation and come right back into the NICU. I think families feel better that their baby is just across the hall, and if we have any problems, it’s easy to have a NICU attending physician come in. It’s just a much safer environment for the babies.”

Before Dr. Cosentino performed the first surgery in the new room, TMC chaplains joined nursing staff, physicians and operating room staff for a special blessing.

“To me it was just wonderful,” Dr. Cosentino said. “I cried. I had been such an advocate of having this and it was so nice to see it come to fruition. It was a wonderful part of my career here at TMC.”