The neonatal intensive care unit at the Lucile Packard Children’s ) ) Hospital works with only the sickest babies. As a result, most infants—unlike ) ) Emma Thompson or Fiona Nink—stay just a few days before moving back ) ) to Stanford-affiliated hospitals in the Bay Area or to hospitals closer ) ) to their hometowns. “We operate kind of like a MASH unit around here,” physician Louis Halamek says. “We are moving ) ) infants in and out all the time.”
Traffic at the unit looked like this in 2001:
• 1,539 babies were admitted.
• 167 operations were performed.
• Besides cardiac surgery, operations included liver, kidney, heart ) ) and lung transplants, craniofacial and plastic surgery and orthopedic ) ) surgery.
• The unit’s mortality rate was 4 percent.
According to Matt Lash, the hospital’s news and communications manager, ) ) these figures should be similar for 2002, except that “the number ) ) of surgical cases is likely to rise as we see more of the sickest babies ) ) and more of the patients Dr. Reddy and Dr. Hanley will treat.”
