Tour of Children's Mercy Hospital

On April 4th we received a tour of Children's Mercy Hospital. This is where Kinley will have her surgery and receive the majority of her care as a newborn.

Our visit started with a meeting between Kathy, myself, a Nurse Practitioner, a Neonatologist and a Surgeon. At this meeting we were given a verbal walk-thru on what to expect when Kinley arrives. Kathy and I learned a lot of new information. For starters, since Kinley will be intubated at birth there is a very good chance that we will never hear her cry when she is born. The delivery room will be very very full, with multiple nurses and doctors, most of them there to take care of Kinley. Before Kinley is transferred, by ambulance from St. Luke's to Children's Mercy, the transfer team will make sure that Kathy has a chance to see her. Once at Children's Mercy, Kinley's stats will be monitored, but if they are not looking good then she will be placed on ECMO (Extracorporeal Membrane Oxygenation). ECMO is a heart and lung bypass machine and it is considered to be a last option treatment. ECMO can only be done once, but it would allow Kinley to rest her heart and lungs. Surgery can be done while on ECMO, but the surgeons would prefer that she not be on ECMO because it requires blood thinners which would increase her chance of bleeding during the operation. For about the first month we will not be able to hold, pick up or feed Kinley due to her being on a ventilator. Kinley's entire visit to Children's Mercy will probably be between 2 and 3 months.

After our meeting, the Nurse Practitioner and Neonatologist gave us a tour of Children's Mercy. We started in the NICU, which stands for Neonatal Intensive Care Unit. Children's Mercy's "Level IV Intensive Care Nursery or NICU provides the most advanced technology in neonatal and surgical care available in the Midwest region, including ECMO and nitric oxide therapy." This is where all of the new born babies who need special care stay. One area in the NICU, where Kinley will be staying, is kept dark and quiet so the babies can rest more easily. This same area is right next door to the NICU operating room, where they will do surgery and put the babies on ECMO. Children's Mercy NICU has a separate operating room for the babies so they do not have to be moved too far for surgery. While we visited this portion of the NICU we met Sofia Rose Miller and her mother Jennifer. Sofie was born on March 10th with a CDH on the left side of her diaphragm. Jennifer was kind enough to give us the website of their blog for Sofie. Following Sofie's blog has given us a lot of information and helped us to prepare for our adventure with Kinley. If you would like to visit Sofie, her blog is at http://www.babymiller08.blogspot.com/. After leaving Sofie and her mom, so they could rest, we headed to the Ronald McDonald Room. This room is designed for parents who are visiting their babies, but still need a place to get away and relax. It includes a living room, kitchen, rooms with beds and bathrooms with showers.

Kathy and I were very impressed with the staff and facilities at Children's Mercy Hospital and feel better knowing that Kinley will be in good hands while she is there.