Hospital Labors to Provide a Perfect Place for New Families
Obstetrical services are continually being reborn at Hackley Hospital.
During the hospital's first year, 24 babies were delivered. Since then, Hackley Hospital has greeted more than 103,000 new arrivals -- more than anywhere else in the region.
"It is the most happy part of medicine," said Dr. Frank Pettinga, a family practitioner who came to Muskegon in 1954, served as medical director of Hackley Hospital for eight years and is now the director for International Medicine for American Overseas Clinics Corp.
He delivered 270 babies in one year.
"Bringing a new child into a home is a great feeling," Pettinga said.
Hackley was one of the first hospitals to convert from maternity wards to the modern labor and delivery rooms, according to Linda Duchon, RN, director of Women & Children's Services at Hackley.
In the 1930s, 1940s and 1950s, nurses double-wrapped the newborn before giving him or her to the mother, according to Duchon. Then, it was back to the nursery for the "Breastfeeding was not encouraged," Duchon said. "The nurses made their own formula (for the newborns)."
Today, the newly remodeled Family Birth Place at Hackley Hospital features homey rooms decorated in soft colors where the mother and baby can stay together. A certified lactation consultant is available and there is a store on-site where nursing mothers can buy supplies -- everything from breast pumps to nursing bras. Fathers take an active role in their child's birth.
"Dads never went into the delivery room until around 1970 or 1971," Duchon said.
Over the years, the celebration of birth has gone from hospital stays of almost a week for moms housed in wards to a couple days in a private room.
"The average stay is usually two days, not counting labor," Duchon said. "The mother and baby need time to bond, and it's also a teaching time for new parents."
Nel Luhman, a 1960 graduate of Hackley Hospital School of Nursing who worked as an obstetrics nurse for about 40 years, recalled that "back in the good old days," new mothers had to stay in bed about three to five days. Nurses would give patients ether and chloroform so they were asleep when the baby was being born, she said.
"I loved my job and being there for the mothers," Luhman said.
The nurses in obstetrics at Hackley Hospital today have more than 600 years in combined experience, according to Duchon. It is not unusual for many of these nurses to have worked for 20 or 30 years, she said.
Throughout the years, Hackley has stayed on the forefront of obstetric care. It was one of the first community hospitals of its size in Michigan to bring back electronic fetal monitoring in the early 1970s and one of the first to have a whirlpool available in the obstetrics department, according to Duchon.
Hackley also is able to care for premature babies, according to Duchon. All of the nurses in the obstetrics unit are certified in neonatal resuscitation and there is a designated special nursery care nurse, she said. Babies born in larger area hospitals are often "transferred back" to Hackley to be closer to their families, she added.
Mothers with high-risk pregnancies can be examined at Hackley instead of having to travel to larger hospitals in the region, Duchon said. The hospital has recruited new obstetricians/gynecologists to the area to keep up with demand. A board-certified nurse-midwife also is available.
"Midwives have come full circle," said Gordon Mudler, president and chief executive officer of Hackley Hospital. He cited the growing number of mothers today who are interested in using midwives, a common practice in the early 1900s when the hospital first opened.
"When you look back at Hackley's history, you'll find that the hospital has traditionally stepped out of the box to provide outstanding patient care," Duchon said.
It has always been Hackley's position to be proactive, Duchon said. The most recent example was the hospital's decision to join a growing number of community hospitals nationwide in discontinuing VBACs (vaginal birth after Caesarean).
"Patient safety and quality care are at the heart of this decision," Lourice David, M.D., chairman of the obstetrical department at Hackley, said in a press release.
Duchon said that the decision brings Hackley in line with the guidelines recommended by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists and the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations.
The guidelines also call for an obstetrician and an anesthesiologist to be available in the obstetrical unit at all times. The physicians cannot be "on call" or performing other duties in the obstetrical unit or in the hospital, according to the ACOG.
Recent medical journal articles show that uterine ruptures in women attempting VBACs may be catastrophic, placing at risk the health of the mother and the newborn. Uterine ruptures require immediate surgery, Duchon said.
"We recognize that this is an emotional issue for many women," Duchon said. "Yet, this decision is about providing the highest level of quality care and safety to our patients.
"The studies show the risk is simply too great to both mother and child.
"We need to step out and be in the forefront, and do the right thing."
A 14-pound, 12-ounce baby boy was welcomed by his parents, Mr. and Mrs.Chester Cecot, at Hackley Hospital in December 1957.
They're calling him "Mighty Mite," a newspaper article proclaimed.
Named Robert Allen by his proud parents, the baby established a birth-weight record. Mother and baby are doing "just fine," the article stated.
Reprinted with permission from the Muskegon Chronicle
