All the journals have recently narrated the curious story of the
triplets that were born prematurely at the clinic of Assas Street.
Placed at their birth in an apparatus constructed on the principle of
an incubator, in order to finish their development therein, these
frail beings are doing wonderfully well, thanks to the assiduous care
bestowed upon them, and are even showing, it appears, a true emulation
to become persons of importance.
Every one now knows the incubator or "artificial hen"--that box with a
glass top in which, under the influence of a mild heat, hens' eggs,
laid upon wire cloth, hatch of themselves in a few days, and allow
pretty little chicks to make their way out of the cracked shell.
This ingenious apparatus, which has been adopted by most breeders,
gives so good results that it has already supplanted the mother hens
in all large poultry yards, and at present, thanks to it, large
numbers of eggs that formerly ended in omelets are now changing into
chickens.
Although not belonging to the same race, a number of children at their
birth are none the less delicate than these little chicks.
There are some that are so puny and frail among the many brought into
the world by the anæmic and jaded women of the present generation
that, in the first days of their existence, their blood, incapable of
warming them, threatens at every instant to congeal in their veins.
There are some which, born prematurely, are so incapable of taking
nourishment of themselves, of breathing and of moving, that they would
be fatally condemned to death were not haste made to take up their
development where nature left it, in order to carry it on and finish
it. In such a case it is not, as might be supposed, to the
exceptionally devoted care of the mother that the safety of these
delicate existences is confided. As the sitting hen often interferes
with the hatching of her eggs by too much solicitude, so the most
loving and attentive mother, in this case, would certainly prove more
prejudicial than useful to her nursling. So, for this difficult task
that she cannot perform, there is advantageously substituted for her
what is known as an artificial mother. This apparatus, which is
identical with the one employed for the incubation of chickens,
consists of a large square box, supporting, upon a double bottom, a
series of bowls of warm water. Above these vessels, which are renewed
as soon as the temperature lowers, is arranged a basket filled with
cotton, and in this is laid, as in a nest, the weak creature which
could not exist in the open air.
[Illustration: STILL BIRTH WARMING APPARATUS.]
Through the glass in the cover, the mother has every opportunity of
watching the growth of her new born babe; but this is all that she is
allowed to do. The feeding of the infant, which is regulated by the
physician at regular hours, is effected by means of a special rubber
apparatus, through the aid of an intelligent woman who has sole charge
of this essential operation. The aeration of the little being, which
is no less important, is assured by a free circulation, in the box, of
pure warm air, which is kept at a definite temperature and is
constantly renewed through a draught flue. The least variations in the
temperature are easily seen through a horizontal thermometer placed
beneath the glass.
Thus protected against all those bad influences that are often so
fatal at the inception of life, even to the healthiest babes,
preserved from an excess or insufficiency of food, sheltered from cold
and dampness, protected against clumsy handling and against pernicious
microbes, sickly or prematurely born babies soon acquire enough
strength in the apparatus to be able, finally, like others, to face
the various perils that await us from the cradle.
The results that have been obtained for some time back at Paris, where
the surroundings are so unfavorable, no longer leave any doubt as to
the excellence of the process. At the lying-in clinic of Assas Street,
Doctors Farnier, Chantreuil, and Budin succeeded in a few days in
bringing some infants born at six months (genuine human dolls,
weighing scarcely more than from 2¼ to 4½ pounds) up to the normal
weight of 7½ pounds.--_L'Illustration._
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