How Sharjah doctor prevented surgery on newborn baby

Filipino baby Kelly Hope was experiencing bowel obstruction

Sharjah: An invasive treatment was prevented on a newborn baby, thanks to a Sharjah doctor who observed the baby’s condition and treated her with enema.

Filipino baby Kelly Hope, who was experiencing bowel obstruction symptoms after she was born, avoided an unnecessary surgery after a doctor from University Hospital Sharjah (UHS) observed her condition and found that the highly thick meconium was the reason behind her obstructed bowel.

Her parents Ryan and Mary Hope were desperately looking for treatment after a physician at the time of their baby’s birth in another hospital suspected that the infant’s colon was obstructed and she needed to be transferred for an operation.

Ryan and Mary were turned away by more than one hospital before they sought medical attention from UHS, where Prof Hakam Yaseen, senior consultant neonatologist and head of the Department of Paediatric and NICU, took care of Kelly’s bowel obstruction.

The doctor found the case to be common among babies and said doctors should be aware that the meconium can obstruct an infant’s bowel and that it doesn’t require a surgery.

He said the stool normally consists of various products the baby ingests in the womb that have been shed, as well as mucus, bile, water, amniotic fluid and the soft hair that cover’s the baby’s body.

“Sometimes a baby’s stool, the meconium, is highly viscid and blocks the intestine. We gave the baby an enema and washed the colon. Afterward, her condition stabilised, passing motion normally and the vomiting no longer persisted,” he said.

He advised the mother to only feed Kelly small portions and five days later, Kelly went home with a clean bill of health.

“My wife was crying with worry,” said Ryan. Late in the night, he and his friend went to the NICU to visit their baby. “Kelly had a tube in her mouth. We just wanted to take our baby home. We felt completely helpless.”

Improving the awareness of meconium consistency will prevent unnecessary surgeries from being performed on newborns with bowel obstruction symptoms, Prof Yaseen said.