Emergency births: Babies born with the help of 000 call takers
‘Hello, what is your emergency?’. ‘I’m having a baby!’ In 2019 more bubs than usual decided to make a dramatic entrance without leaving much time for their parents to grab the hospital bag, let alone the phone to call triple-0. LISTEN TO 000 CALL
NSW
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It’s getting crowded on the “stork wall” at the NSW Ambulance Sydney Control Centre — 2019 has been a bumper year for babies born with the assistance of triple-0 operators.
And behind every name is a story crowned by the joyful sound of a baby’s cries transmitted down a phone line as new life enters the world in dramatic circumstances.
Up until November 30, 213 impatient bundles of joy were born during a triple-0 call to NSW Ambulance call takers at the Control Centre in Eveleigh in inner city Sydney.
For triple-0 call-takers like Laura Turner Cook, assisting a birth is one of the most stressful experiences but also wonderful highlights, of the job.
“It’s a fantastic experience, it’s nerve-racking, there is impending excitement and fear and that hold your breath moment, which feels like forever, before baby starts crying and then that first cry every time brings tears to my eyes, it’s such a great sound,” the 39-year-old said.
In the job for just 18 months, Ms Turner-Cook has personally assisted 30-40 births over the phone.
“Everyone enjoys the moment of bringing in new life into the world. When a baby is born by a call-taker over the phone, their name goes up on the stork wall and we have about 30 names up there. It rotates quite often, so lots of new bundles being brought into the world,” she said.
Babies such as Brody Cromarty who, on December 3, decided to surprise his mum and dad with a dramatic entrance.
Paul Cromarty and Tegan Porteous went to hospital as she went into the early stages of labour, but since their two older children each took their leisurely time to arrive, the hospital agreed the couple could go home for some lunch and come back later.
Shortly after arriving back in their Belmont home in Newcastle, things changed very quickly.
“I’d been in the shower and the contractions were on top of each other,” Ms Porteous said.
“Paul was trying to get me to get dressed and get in the car and I was trying to so hard to put myself in the car and then I just said ‘no, I can’t leave, we need to stay’.”
Ms Porteous, 29, had an epidural with their first two bubs, so it was new territory, but she instinctively knew the baby was coming imminently and Mr Cromarty called triple-0.
“They instructed me to strip off and get on the bed and at that point it was starting to sink in — holy cow, this is happening,” she said.
“It was pretty full on,” Mr Cromarty, 35, said.
“It was daunting and scary and she was having severe contractions and the operator said she was going to have the baby.
“I was trying to keep Tegan calm and listen to the operator and all of a sudden a big contraction came and the head came out. She was pretty scared and I was holding the head.”
Ms Porteous said: “I was in shock when he came out. You want to hear your baby cry and he came out perfect, it was short and sweet and a rush of pure love and happiness.”
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Brody weighed a healthy 3.65kg.
“I had tears in my eyes. It’s up there with the best experience I have ever had, it was frightening and scary at the time, but looking back, it’s pretty special,” Mr Cromarty said.
The couple’s two older children Isaac, 7, and Lara, 4, and Mr Cromarty all proposed to Ms Porteous on Christmas Day.
“He gave me the ultimate push present, we’re engaged and I feel very lucky,” Ms Porteous said.
A dramatic birth, nerve-racking, enough, is even more so when you are told you cannot deliver naturally but your babies decide otherwise.
Angelique Vercoe, 40, from Coal Point on Lake Macquarie was 34 weeks pregnant with her twins when she went into early labour at home in July.
Already a mum to five, she had a fair idea of pregnancy, but this one was tricky.
One baby was in a breech position and the other was traverse, lying cross ways, so she had been told she would likely need a caesarean.
Racing toward John Hunter Hospital, with father Donovan Mitchell, in the ambulance, they only got as far as the Glendale KFC when Ariki arrived.
“The breech one came out first, Ariki, he came out in his sac, it didn’t burst and kept him nice and tight and bundled and made it easier and the sac did not burst until it hit the bed (in the ambulance),” Ms Vercoe said.
“The paramedics put Ariki on my stomach until we arrived at the hospital with a team of doctors and nurses waiting out the front.”
Andre was born 30 minutes later in hospital after being manually turned in utero. Ariki weighed 1.8kg and Andrew 2kg.
“The boys are wonderful, they have kicked goals from the start,” Ms Vercoe said.
Originally published as Emergency births: Babies born with the help of 000 call takers