RSV

Hello all. For those of you that know what RSV is, don't worry, the kids don't have it right now. For those of you that don't know, RSV stands for Respiratory Syncytial Virus. We're still learning about it, but it's like a bad cold or pneumonia. It's peak season is the about the same as the cold and flu season, fall to spring.

The reason I'm posting about it is that we've learned that our kids will have a tougher time fighting it because they were born prematurely. If they were to get it now they would have more trouble fighting it than a full-term baby because they did not receive all the immunity to fight infections (from Jen) before being born. They would almost certainly have to go back to the hospital if they got it. We want to continue our success when they come home.

We have been extremely fortunate that the kids have not had any infections so far, as it is very common (almost expected) for babies in the NICU to get at least one infection while there. Our good fortune is in large part due to the limited amount of visitors we have brought to the NICU as well as our commitment to washing our hands and using sanitizer prior to handling the kids.

What this means is that we need to limit the number of people the kids come in contact with and ensure that they don't come in contact with anyone who is sick. There are a number of rules that we are going to have to follow when they come home based on hospital recommendations and research we've done.

1. No children visitors during RSV season during the first 2 years.
2. Limited children visitors during off season during the first 2 years.
3. Children visitors are not allowed to touch the babies.
4. No visitors/helpers that have been sick within the last 10 days.
5. No visitors/helpers that feel they are getting sick, even just a little tingle.
6. All visitors/helpers will be required to wash hands and use sanitizer prior to touching/holding the babies.
7. Visitors/helpers will only be able to hold one baby at a time.
8. We will be limiting outings with the babies.

I want to stress to everyone that we are not trying to prevent anyone from seeing the kids, but we need to do everything we can to keep them healthy. We've waited a very long time and worked very hard to get this far and cannot let our guard down now. We are our childrens' advocates and need to be strict about this issue. I'll be the first to admit that despite the fact that the kids were born premature, I figured as soon as they were allowed to come home that we would be able to proceed as would be done with full-term babies. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Although we can expect no long term effects from them being born premature, the first few years of their lives will have some differences from full-term babies.

We don't know exactly how we're going to handle holidays and things of that sort, but we will try to make things work as best we can. Again, we don't intend to offend anyone, but we ask that you please respect our wishes and follow the above rules and any that we may need to add in the future. Thank you.

Please contact us with any questions, comments, concerns, etc.

Jeremy