RICHMOND, Va. -- A new $28 million, 20 bed neonatal intensive care unit just opened, bringing the hospital's total number of NICU beds to 60. This means a larger number of tiny patients will have access to expert care. Dr. Russell Moores, NICU Medical Director at CHoR answers these 4 questions about what the higher capacity in our NICU means for our patients and the community.
Can you tell us about the NICU expansion and what having more capacity means for our region’s smallest and most fragile patients?
There’s been a NICU at VCU or MCV, as it used to be called, for over 50 years. The most recent version of that NICU is in VCU Health’s Critical Care Hospital and has 40 beds, but the demand for what we do has gone up tremendously over the years, which means we were always full, and sometimes overfull. When we realized how often we needed more space, we started the plans to build a new unit. Now, we still have the 40 bed NICU in the Critical Care Hospital, but now we also have another 20 bed NICU across the street in the Children’s Tower. Despite being in separate buildings, they function as one large NICU. The same doctors, nurses and other specialists take care of babies in both units, providing the same high level of care for which we’re known. That means we can take care of more patients in the Richmond area.
CHoR’s NICU is a Level 4 NICU, what does that mean and what types of patients do you care for?
A Level 4 is the highest level of neonatal intensive care. That means we have specialized doctors, nurses, therapists, dietitians, pharmacists, case managers, social workers and many other providers needed to care for whatever a premature or critically ill newborn may need. We also have the appropriate equipment and expertise to take care of most any medical and surgical problem that a baby may have. We can care for the tiniest premature babies that may be born as early as 22 weeks gestational age (just a little over halfway through pregnancy), all the way up to kids that are born closer to the term but have some very complex medical and surgical issues. It also means that we can assist other NICUs in the area when they have patients that require a higher level of care than they can provide in their hospital.
So many features in the Tower NICU had families in mind. What makes this NICU so unique?
Babies can be in the NICU for a long time. They can be with us for weeks or many months, some for as long as a year, and that’s difficult for families. I know from personal experience, my youngest child was in a NICU for a while, so it's tough but also very important for families to be involved in their baby’s care. Babies tend to do better when the families are involved. When we designed the NICU expansion, we wanted to make it as comfortable for families as we could. It has 16 single patient rooms and two twin rooms and all of the rooms are huge, but the twin rooms are absolutely enormous. Not only do we have more space, there are places for families to sleep, lots of storage space and even private bathrooms, which is something rather unique for a NICU. Not only that, the families are welcome to use all the other amenities in the Children’s Hospital itself.
It takes special people to do this work. Can you tell us about your team and their commitment to these tiny patients?
Our NICU team is truly a team. It is a very big team taking care of tiny patients, but we all love babies and we love taking care of them, but we also really enjoy working with the families too. We get to know them, and they get to know us. That means we rejoice with them when things go well and grieve with them when things don’t go well. But there’s nothing like seeing a baby who’s been in the NICU for a long time get to go home, or when the families bring them back to show us how they’re doing. It truly is magical. That’s why we do this. Sponsored by Children's Hospital of Richmond at VCU.
