At just two weeks old and at 1.8 kilograms, baby Ahluma has blossomed into a bouncing boy, but the story of his life could have been written differently were it not for his mom’s daring and his doctor’s skill.
Ahluma was delivered by caesarean operation on Wednesday 31 January at the Tygerberg Hospital’s High Risk Clinic.
According to his mom Ntombizethu Peter, Ahluma is a miracle child as she had been struggling to give birth after losing three of her unborn children to miscarriages.
After this, Peter heard of an operation called Trans-Abdominal Cerclage(TAC), which is performed to save a baby from imminent miscarriage.
The Trans-Abdominal Cerclage(TAC) is a high risk operation where the surgeon makes caesarean like incision, before moving the uterus out of the way and then placing the stitch at the top where the cervix starts and the uterus ends, to stop the baby from making a premature exit.
“I have two other children, with whom I also struggled, as they were premature births.
My husband and I badly wanted to have a third child but the three miscarriages made it almost impossible,” she said.
Ahluma was delivered success fully after Peter had undergone the high risk procedure to make sure that she does not have a miscarriage.
Thanks to Professor David Hall, Ahluma is alive today for his mother to tell this story.
“After the last loss during pregnancy in 2016, I became distraught ... But after finding out that I was pregnant again, I came to the high risk clinic to seek help.
“I begged them to do the TAC procedure but the only doctor that can do it was on leave so he came especially to help me,” she added.
According to information received, the operation is so risky that it can only be conduct by a handful of doctors in the country, with Tygerberg’s Specialist Obstetrician and Gynaecologist Professor David Hall, being one of them.
“When I first went to the clinic, Dr Hall was away on leave and Dr Zoe Momberg, said we’d have to wait a little as she had done few such operations.
He came out of his rest to do the operation ... It was scary but I had hope at the same time, as I had already lost other children to this procedure, but the risk was worth taking,” she added.
Professor Hall emphasized Peter’s courage for allowing him to conduct the operation despite the risks.
“It’s a very risky operation in that we have to halt the blood supply to the child during the hour long operation. The operation itself could have ended the child’s life but we are very happy that he is a healthy boy.
We would like to warn high risk mothers to come to the clinic before conceiving a baby,” said Hall.
He said that they were very happy to be able to assist Peter, especially being a public hospital system that often gets flack for the all the wrong reasons.
“We have to manage the bad perception by fixing the bad things but we must also celebrate when there are successes,” he said.
Mother and baby are safe and healthy.
