Birthin' Babies

SCRUBS Mentoring Program, Barbara Stone - CNM, Charleston, SC

Long day, kids, but if there is a shortage of medical professionals in the Lowcountry ten years from now, it isn't going to be my fault.

I had 38 teenagers this evening traipsing around the Labor & Delivery unit thinking they wanted to work in Obstetrics. We set up stations in the birthing rooms so they could learn about care of a woman in labor and delivery. One of our ultrasound techs happened to be seventeen weeks pregnant and offered to be a guinea pig so they could see a live ultrasound, which was a big hit.

Certified Nurse Midwife Barbara Stone showed them how a cloth baby rotates through a plastic pelvis and then my buddy Ginger startled the kids by uncovering a real placenta and raved about it like the miraculous organ that it is. Dr. Victor Weinstien talked about complications in pregnancy and we let them pass around an old pair of forceps which always make such an impressive clanking noise. Good stuff.

Thanks to my buddies Ginger, Kelly, Lorrie and Kristen for making an evening these kids will never forget.

PS: Sometimes it is easy to tell a baby is a girl even before she is completely born. Heheh.

Time for me to get to bed. Tomorrow is "Go Red" for heart disease awareness. The American Heart Association is trying to gather enough women dressed in red to form a human heart at Marion Square around 9 a.m. If anyone is local and available, join in!