Wisconsin mother meets baby in COVID-19 coma



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Almost three months after Kelsey Townsend gave birth to her fourth child, the 32-year-old from Wisconsin has finally come face to face with her.

Lucy, now bright-eyed and alert, gave him a smile.

“Hi. I love you. I love you so much. Yeah, I missed you,” Kelsey Townsend told her.

Townsend was in a medically induced coma from COVID-19 when she gave birth to Lucy by Caesarean section on November 4, shortly after arriving at SSM Health St. Mary’s Hospital in Madison. She ended up spending 75 days on life and lung support. She finally met Lucy on January 27 – the day Kelsey was released from Madison University Hospital.

“We bonded immediately when we met. She gave me a big smile and looked at me like she knew exactly who I was and it made me feel so happy, ”said the woman from Poynette, Wisconsin.

Dr Jennifer Krupp, specialist in maternal fetal medicine and medical director of women’s and newborn health for SSM Health Wisconsin Region, said it was rare for the hospital to deliver to a mother so sick with COVID. -19.

Kelsey Townsend’s oxygen saturation was very low when she arrived at the hospital – so low that a fetus’ brain and other organs could be damaged – and her skin was tinged with gray and blue, the Dr Thomas Littlefield emailed Wednesday, so his baby had to be delivered as soon as possible.

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Doctors believed Townsend may need a double lung transplant at the end of December. But then she started to improve – so much so that she was moved out of the intensive care unit, taken off a ventilator in mid-January, and taken off the transplant waiting list.

Townsend’s husband, Derek Townsend, described the experience as a “big roller coaster”.

“There were many, many nights that I got phone calls late at night and early in the morning, and the doctors kind of informed me that they had done all they could to support Kelsey and that they struggled to stabilize. , “he said.” So we thought many times that we were going to lose her.

Derek Townsend says even his little girl seemed to notice someone was missing while his wife was still hospitalized.

“The last three months with Lucy, you know her head is still moving and she is still watching. And I told Kelsey that I believe she’s always looking for her, ”he said.

The couple contracted COVID-19 despite the precautions taken, Derek Townsend said. As he got better his wife got worse. It was then that they went to the hospital.

“Family is everything to me,” Kelsey Townsend said. “So I have everything to live here and come home. There was no doubt that I would not.

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