FORMER PREEMIES CELEBRATE HEALTH
Healthy toddlers at event were once touch-and-go cases.
BOCA RATON — Maele Hargett didn’t know how emotional Sunday morning was going to be for her, but she and her daughter had already been through a lot.
Hargett’s daughter, Ember, was born prematurely a year ago.
“She wasn’t breathing, had the cord around her neck, and I had an infection,” said Hargett, 41, of Delray Beach as she recalls the birth of her daughter a year ago. “They had to keep her for almost a month. She couldn’t eat on her own. It was a hard year.”
But the end of the year finished joyously, with Ember joining Alessia, Paulina, Alen, and Paul among dozens of children who gathered Sunday morning at Town Center.
All of these kids were born prematurely, treated at the Level III neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) at West Boca Medical Center.
The annual NICU reunion kicked off inside the food court with a live D J, balloons, face painting, hula hoops and a large-sized “Operation” game board. It was an opportunity for these children to meet each other and play games, as parents wrote “Thank You” messages to the staff that assisted them through grayer days.
Hargett was assisted by the staff at West Boca Medical’s NICU through 14 hours of labor and beyond delivery day as her daughter was fighting to stay alive. Meanwhile, Hargett was accompanied by both grandmothers as Ember’s dad was out on a business trip and didn’t expect Hargett to go into labor so early.
The baby was born a month early, weighing in at 5.9 pounds. Dad arrived the following day.
Today, Ember is a healthy toddler, and on Sunday wore Hawaiian leis, face paint and a tutu for the big occasion.
“I was crying on the way here. I didn’t realize it would be so emotional,” Hargett said. “I’m hoping to see her nurses, and see if they recognize her.”
For baby Ember, today is a huge day — it’s been exactly one year since she finally went home to her parents and her pets, Retter, a golden retriever, and two cats, Audrey and Mulvie. She also started walking less than 24 hours earlier.
But the celebration wasn’t only for the babies and their parents. To staff members, seeing that these former patients are healthy is the reason they do what they do.
“This means everything to me. These babies are the most incredible clientele you could work with,” said Meredith Haney, West Boca Medical’s clinical nurse manager of pediatric services. “They’re tough, much tougher than you would imagine. When we see these results and these happy families, it allows you to go back and do it again.”
West Boca Medical treats mothers and their babies from regular checkups to very high-risk cases through their Birth Care Pavilion and Level III neonatal ICU.
‘This means everything to me. These babies are the most incredible clientele you could work with. They’re tough, much tougher than you would imagine. When we see these results and these happy families, it allows you to go back and do it again.’ Meredith Haney Clinical nurse manager of pediatric services, West Boca Medical Center