I Can’t Believe It’s Not Smart Monitor 1!
Both of my babies went into the NICU after birth. Tiny Human A was discharged with me after a typical 4 day stay but Tiny Human B was in the NICU for a whopping 28 days. I birthed them in a hospital about 50 mins from home so it was a long haul round trip every day with A to be with B. The week that B got discharged, they didn’t actually know she would be discharged because she had a funky heart rate reading one day that meant she needed to be monitored for 7 days (don’t quote me on this it was a while ago, 5 days or 7 I forget which) with no weird heart rate readings before she could be released. One morning we walked into her room and the doctor said we could take her home. While we were excited at the possibility, we were surprised and asked, “Doesn’t she need to be monitored for one more day to make sure her heart is safe?”
Enter: The Smart Monitor 2!
The dream machine that would allow us to finally bring our entire family home.
A woman, whom we had never seen before, walked into our room and handed me what looked like a Super Nintendo in a shoulder bag. She made sure to share that the bag was included just in case we were going, and I quote, “out and about” with the baby. “Out and About?!” What could make me wanna go mall walking more than a partially severed abdominal muscle, and two babies under five pounds? Attaching one to the boom box I had in my room when I was nine.
So, she gave me a very quick demo and a pamphlet to take home that explained how it worked, and told us that the machine will alarm if B’s heart or air function go below a certain level. It was all a little scary, but I figured…
“We can figure this out…What’s a few days of monitoring at home?”
What she NEGLECTED to tell me was that the leads (tiny little electrode wires that attach the machine to the baby), which look like this:
BEHAVE like this:
Oh and also, that no one can read the machine other than a pulmonary specialist, who won’t receive data from the machine until we’ve had it for 30 days, at which point we can learn if B is having any actual episodes or if it’s all just the leads getting caught on shit. To which we say….
We learned all of this AFTER we started being charged for use of the machine (which we could not leave the hospital without) and of course after realizing that it is completely worthless. I say this because as the primary users:
WE, the people with the actual machine and ACTUAL HUMAN BABY, could not interpret from the machine if the alarm was going off because the baby was ACTUALLY having a life threatening episode OR….
the cord got stuck on the baby’s foot and pulled the leads off
if moving the baby shifted the cord and it came loose from the machine
if the machine was just on a coffee break and forgot to clock out first
The stupid alarm was the most stressful part of the first month of mothering at home…
My pediatrician said parents complain about this ALL THE TIME.
I also learned that:
Without signing a waiver “against medical advice” I can’t stop using the machine without at least 30 days of data, and of course the data needs to look “typical” to no longer require monitoring, and THEN you need someone to come out to your home, download the data off the machine, take it back to the hospital, have a Pulmonary Specialist look at it (who, as I found out, does this as a side gig, it’s not even part of their job at our particular hospital according to the person who downloaded the information) WHICH MEANS that the data doesn’t get interpreted for roughly 2-3 weeks BEYOND the 30 days of info they were collecting. And THAT'S NOT ALL FOLKS, the pulmonologist has to call your pediatrician to give the OK that the monitor no longer needs to be used. At which point... you have to schedule for someone to come back to your house to pick up the device, and you don’t stop being charged until the device is gone from your home...whenever the hell that might be.
If you felt like that explanation was too damn long… you are correct!
You should have been there in real time with tiny humans, no sleep, and no effing clue just waiting for people to return your calls and explain this shit to you… And if you are or have been in that position, I hope you can laugh at the ridiculousness of it all, and the fact that you are not alone.
So, let me recap with the convo that SHOULD have taken place when we were leaving the hospital:
NICU: Oh, you’ve been coming to the NICU every day for a month? For no reason whatsoever, TODAY’S THE DAY you can all go home!
US: But what about her heart rate?
NICU: Oh, that. Well, you could stay for just one more day to make sure it’s all fine, OR we could send you home for an undetermined number of days with what looks like a VCR but is definitely a vital stats monitor, that has arbitrarily been named the Smart Monitor 2. It constantly needs to be plugged in to work, not necessarily properly, and will attach via string and toothpaste to your child’s chest, so don’t ever move, bathe or change her because they will inevitably fall off and cause a mis-read of information.
Now because there is no way for ANYONE to read the data from the outside of the machine, there’s no real way to know if your baby’s heart is actually failing when the alarm goes off in the middle of the night or if she is just moving, like any baby would. But don’t you worry, if her heart or airway IS failing then you will know by the slight blue discoloration that appears on her skin, and it’s at that point that you should call for help immediately. But otherwise, just assume she is fine and wait somewhere between 30 days and the end of time for a doctor to interpret this information, in their free time, to learn that she is either totally fine or suffering from a serious medical condition that we’ve left untreated for far too long. Ok… on your way! Enjoy!
To this day… despite all the frustration and aggravation that the Smart Monitor 2 caused us… one question still burns in my brain…
How the ACTUAL FUCK could this be the second edition??
What was the first?? Was it powered by a car battery that you had to Keep attached to the car For it to work...so electrocution was also added to the list of grievances?
Was it like Doc Brown’s brain scanner from Back to the Future?? (I apologize for the terrible Photoshop job!)
After much thought, I think it must have been a brick… just a plain old brick, which unfortunately might have been more useful.
About Jessica Jack
Twin Mama, stand-up comedian, former school counselor, yoga instructor & more