Regardless of education, this is how neighbourhood or family influence over medical advice may carry dangerous consequence for pregnant women and their newborns.
Maryam Isa (middle), Hadiza (left), Bilkisu (R)Maryam was a novice in carrying pregnancy and giving birth. So when she had her first pregnancy, she got all sorts of advices from ‘experienced’ mothers. One of such advices was that it was too early for her to go for antenatal care. She should wait until the sixth month.Even though a doctor had told her to begin antenatal care early, the advice of the ‘experienced’ mothers prevailed.So, Maryam counted up to six months before she visited the hospital, where she discovered that her baby was not in the normal position. The doctors called it a breech.“I was advised to do a lot of exercise, rest, eat balanced diet, eat fruits, take a lot of water, and frequently change my sitting positions.” She told me that she abided by these ‘rules’, which were awkward because, being a very busy civil servant and a wife, it took extra effort to fit into the new duties that came with being pregnant.Watch out, danger ahead!“I was six months when the complications started. I started having slight pains on my left leg, which I didn’t think had anything to do with my pregnancy”, she said.“Normally then”, she continued, “the antenatal care in that hospital was held twice a week and when I went, I was told twice to go for a scan. During the second scan, the result revealed that the position of the baby had still not changed”.Maryam then began praying, and also hoping that before her due date, Umar would be lying in the normal position.Pains came knockingOne Saturday, just about a week before the eighth month of the pregnancy, Maryam started having pains again. Her next antenatal care appointment was the following Tuesday, so she decided to endure till then.While she waited for this Tuesday to come, Maryam said she totally lost appetite, had sleepless nights and kept getting knocked by pains on her back.But on Sunday, around 5:00pm, “Suddenly it came! I felt a sharp pain and I wasn’t able to control it any longer. It wasn’t blood, it was just liquid”. Maryam said.Maryam was quickly taken to the hospital, where she was told that she still had some five weeks to go. But after a series of tests, doctors discovered that Umar’s heartbeat was weak. They concluded that in order to save the lives of mother and the unborn child, immediate action had to be taken. The doctors would prepare the theatre, wheel Maryam in there, simply open her abdomen and bring out the baby.The process went well, but something was wrong. When a new baby comes, the first thing it does is cry. But Maryam’s baby simply refused to cry. The healthcare givers tried all their tricks but the tiny little boy didn’t yield.“My baby was then taken to the children’s ICU for proper care”.Incubators rare to findMaryam had her baby preterm, but there was no incubator to help the baby survive. So the doctors used another method. The baby was placed in a make-shift incubator - a glass box put in a very warm room.At that time, “there were many child births and most of them were born through CS and they were premature”. Maryam recounted.After three days in the warm room, Umar started moving his legs. But when it was time to breastfeed the baby, Maryam did not have milk in her breasts. Not even after drinking beverages. Then she started taking a local drink called “Kunnun Tsamiya”. “Later, I was breast-feeding Umar four times in a day. Whenever I had to breastfeed him, I would be guided through washing my hands while the baby would be covered all over, except his mouth for suckling. We spent eight days in the hospital”, she said.Before the hospital let her go with her baby on the 8th day, Maryam must hearken to professional advice that would help keep her preterm baby alive - not to allow too many people touching him, to keep him warm and close to her skin at all times (kangaroo mother care), to keep her windows permanently locked, and to bath him with warm towel and rub olive oil on his skin.“The baby was breastfed exclusively for six months. But in the second month of breastfeeding, he had started gaining weight”, Maryam said.Maryam told me that having a preterm was quite a challenge. “You have to be guided and have a health worker close to you or in touch with you at all times. The baby would require so much attention and time, and I must visit the hospital three to four times a week while spending a lot of money”.As the world commemorated World Prematurity Day, Maryam advised pregnant women, their husbands, in-laws and the whole community to be enlightened about causes and dangers of preterm births. She said that the government too must provide basic necessities at hospitals, especially for pregnant women in the rural areas.“Umar is now six years old,” Maryam said, “more brilliant than most of his peers!”