A baby girl unexpectedly born abroad has celebrated her first birthday.
Parents Joe and Lindsey from Pennsylvania were on holiday in the Turks and Caicos Islands when Lindsey unexpectedly went into labour at just 27 weeks gestation. Baby Logan was delivered via emergency caesarean-section weighing just 2.5lbs.
“When [she was] in surgery, I think that was the point in time when I genuinely thought I was losing my unborn child and my wife”, says Joe.
“The medical care we had in Turks was amazing”, says Lindsey. “They took such good care of me, and honestly, they saved [Logan] and kept her stable”.
With only one hospital in Turks and Caicos with only one ventilator available, the advanced medical care that Logan needed was not possible on the island.
“I’ve been a firefighter for 19 years. I’ve been through crazy chaotic situations, and that had me feeling helpless”, Joe said.
“You’re basically just in full fear and panic mode for 48 straight hours”, he added.
Ultimately, Joe contacted the Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) and got through to the emergency transport team.
“The doctor was like, ‘I’m sorry, who are you?'” Lindsey recalled. “My husband was like, ‘I just had a baby in Turks and Caicos, and we need to get her off the island!'”
The CHOP emergency transport team sent a small aeroplane that arrived on Mothers’ Day to collect baby Logan and her father.
“You could see the relief in his eyes that someone was here to bring his baby back safely”, said Lauren Silvestro, one of CHOP’s emergency transport team.
Little Logan made it safely back to Philadelphia, and was taken to the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) where she was looked after for over 70 days before she went home.
“I think we were the only people in the NICU that actually were so happy to be there, which is such a weird thing to say”, Lindsey said. “But we were so happy to be there, because she was alive and taken care of by CHOP doctors”.
Logan is now one year old and is thriving at home with her older brother Cole.