Pine Bluff daily graphic., 1894-06-18
SAVED BY INCUBATORS.
The Lives of Infants Preserved
 by Artificial Means.
scfences Substitute for Nature Doing Wonders for Prematurely Born Nurslings in New York
 City.


 ssHe was incubated," ," the proud moth- CT of some great man of the future will
 say of her son. For the baby in5 1bator | Is a success and has come to stay. The | doctors declare that incubators have ' already been the means of saving the lives of one hundred infants jn New York In fact, the newborn baby who under old-fashioned methods has no | chance of living, now, If put into an in cubator, stands about an even chance of becoming a healthy, growing young ster. Baby incubators are now in use | in two hospitals in the city.
 A cozier place for baby could not | be Imagined, says the New York World, Here the embryo citizens have every opportunity the world affords to hold on to life and to grow healthy and strong, while in the tenements where their parents live the lives of the frail little things would have been -snuffedl out in less than day after they first saw the light.
 The incubator Is used only for pre- matarely-born babies and for babies which are so weak thatathe wise young
 woman doctors are pretty sure they | will die If left in the open air. Strange | ly enough, the incubator is shaped something like coffin, while its par | ticular aim is to keep babies out of cof- fins. There are two kinds of baby in- cubators, and they differ somewhat in, construction. The babies are taken out | of the ineubators at the Maternity hos pital to get their nourishment directly from their mothers, who live in the building; but the mother in the Post Graduate hospital may not see her off spring from one weeks end to an- other
 Therefore the youngster must be fed | by artificial means, and, after much |experiment and study, the doctors have which the baby is nourished without
 being removed from its snug little nest. The moment baby for the incubator arrives at the Maternity hospital the white-capped nurses and the doctors gathe. about the little wooden box, which rests upon stand some three or | four feet high. Baby is swathed very carefully in warm clothes, and is then
 weighed, clothes and all, before he is. | laid inside and the glass cover Is placed over hi1n.
 Underneath the board upon which | the little mite rests are three bottles that are kept constantly full of hot water. The air passing in from below flows over these and through an open- | ing h the board into the chamber where the Infant is. A thermometers keeps the attendant continually tn- formed as to the temperature, and little aluminium anenonnster In the slnall chimney through which the air escapes, aid which furnishes the draught that keeps the baby supplied ' with fresh air. always indicates wheth- CT or not the circulation of the air is good,
 The weight is very important mat ter. One baby in the incubator is weighed every day. A healthy baby should show B slight diurnal increase | in weight, and if the doctors find that the diminutiye patient is not growing heavier they seek remedies for his in. | disposition. This Is the truest method | they have of ascertaining the baby'sI progress, and therefore the greatest care Is taken that it's clothes shall al-
 ways be of the same weight, as two or three ounces is a considerable increase | for young man or woman whose az
 gregate weight is only six, seven or eight pounds. About seventy per cent. of the ineubated" babies have lived,
 and at least fifty per cent. of these would have died but for the incubator. The incubator which will be in the
 babies ward of the new building of the | Post-Graduate hospital Is a great Ina proyement on that at the Maternity | hospital, although it lacks the senti- mental surroundings of the one in | charge of the young woman doctors. Tho incubator is set upon bicycle | rhcels. so 1t may be moved about when- | sver desired.. The fresh air is heated by passing between two strata of hot | water, rises up both at the head and | hB foot of the mattress and Is kept in | notion by an aluminium fan run by ,lockworls, thus preventing any possi- | 3ility of the little patients suffering | Or want of air. There is also tube Or the supply of oxygen, liberal quan- | itieB of which are good for babies who re hanging on to life by the merest ;hread. and 1t Is believed this improve nent will save great many lives that | would have been lost in the old incu- ' pator.
 By means of clever mechanical de. dce the weight of the baby is always wgistered, so that the physician may iiscover the slightest variation at any
 ime. Infants are subject to tubercular
 diseases, which develop before the doe- or knows what Is the matter. Of
 curse, the incubator must be opened
 D order to feed the baby Its artificial
 ood, but by means of 8 delft sliding of
 he covers the entrance of any cold air
 rom the outside is prevented. The
 emperature of the inside of the incu- 'ator Is kept as near ninety-eight de-
 Tees as possible.
 The aPost-Graduate hospital gets more
 ubjects for incubators than the Ma
 eruity hospital, and the task of bring ng the little ones by slow stages tc
 igor and health Is the more difficult eeause the mothers are not present tc
 urse them. The learned doctors o1
 his Institution have literally snatche6
 lie from the jaws of death on more
 han one occasion.
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