By Kaedy Kiely

Amica was born at Grady Hospital 19 months ago. She weighed two pounds, five ounces at birth and, as a result of her prematurity, she had severe lung problems. Amica has another problem too – an infection called septic hip which required a special brace to be made for her.

Amica is just one of many hundreds of premature babies who have struggled for life in the High Risk Nursery of Atlanta’s Grady Hospital. The nursery is a temporary home for these babies, especially designed to tackle the complications which accompany prematurity.

A visitor to the nursery walks into a world of incubators and monitors (which display brightly colored, hand-made name tags and infant toys) and unbelievably tiny human beings, attached to these machines, whose difficulties range from bleeding in the brain, to heart and lung damage.

“You have to remember that this is just a tiny baby we’re talking about,” explains Donna Carson, social worker for the nursery, as she tells Amica’s story. “Amica had to sit awkwardly in this brace (which resembled a little chair on a slope) for quite some time.” Trying to combat the hip problem was somewhat easier than overcoming Amica’s breathing problems. Cysts had formed within her tiny lungs and one lung was almost totally non-functional, requiring the infant to be supplied with oxygen. “The baby’s problems were so extensive that she literally ‘died’ several times,” remembers Donna. “We were all ready to give up on Amica, but she’s a real fighter.”

Because of the severity of Amica’s problems, she was home with her family only a total of one month out of the next eleven. But now, after nine months at home, her lungs are finally healing. Amica’s mom played a key role in her daughter’s recovery. “The mother never gave up,” recalls Donna. “She was there every single day – she was not going to let this baby die. This mother’s attachment kept her baby alive.”

Not all premature babies recover from their difficulties as Amica has. An average of five premature babies die in the High Risk Nursery at Grady per month. But Donna is quick to point out that “the smaller the baby, the better the chance it has to survive here at Grady than anywhere else in this area.”

Donna Carson’s job as social worker in the nursery varies from day to day. She learns what sort of admissions have come in overnight and speaks with parents on a daily basis about the condition of their child. “We deal more with the parents,” the pretty, young, master’s graduate from University of Georgia explains. “We have to be especially attuned to them and their needs. They need lots of encouragement, particularly when their baby is dying – it’s extremely important for us to humanize that aspect of their trial.”

Donna’s job also involves sitting in on sessions with the child’s family and the medical staff. She says that, sometimes, “the medical staff doesn’t have the time or the skills to explain a baby’s difficulties adequately to the parents. Some parents don’t understand the more technical terms and are afraid to ask questions. So the social worker has to serve as a moderator.”

One of the most important aspects of being a social worker at Gray is to act as a role model for parents. Donna remembers many situations where extremely young teenagers have become parents and weren’t prepared to take care of a newborn infant, especially one with the difficulties of prematurity. “We teach these parents how to hold, feed, and care for their babies. It is very difficult to teach new parents how to manage to cope with themselves as well as their child, who might have a lot of difficulties.”

There are mothers who, after having their babies placed in the high risk nursery, will literally abandon them. “We’ve had some mothers who won’t come in to see their children or even phone to find out how they are doing.” Sometimes a court battle will result and a baby will land in a foster home. But most times, Donna says, parents will come to visit on a regular basis. Some even drive from miles away every day just to be with their child. “I’ve seen some parents drive in every day from another city or town to be here. The expense really mounts up for parking and gas, and many people can’t easily afford that – but they’re still here.”

Grady’s staff and parents have formed a group called THRIVE, a High Risk Infant volunteer effort. Within this group, parents serve to reassure other parents. A family who has had difficulties with a premature child in the past is sometimes matched up with a family who is now having the same difficulties. They meet with Donna and other members of Grady’s staff for learning sessions. “Our goal is to make THRIVE a statewide program of all nurseries for parents who are having especially had times,” Donna adds hopefully.

As Donna sits in a tiny room called “the office” – the only room available to counsel parents and allow mothers time to semi-privately nurse their babies – she points at snapshots of healthy-looking toddlers who have survived their many difficulties at Grady. The photos decorate a large bulletin board directly behind her. She knows most of those little faces in the photos by name, and smiling, she proudly tells story after story about them and their struggles for life in the nursery. “Now when I sit in church and see a newborn baby baptized, I think of the miracle of life. But when I see a baby in the nursery who’s not even supposed to be born yet – struggling to survive in this world and making it – I think to myself: ‘Now that’s a miracle!’”