Global Courant
The relative tranquility that was felt on the Avianca flight TA450 from Honduras to Miami on Thursday, May 25, was interrupted by the moans of a pregnant 18-year-old girl who was beginning to have first-time contractions.
Among the passengers was the well-known doctor from Ceiba, Suamy Bermudez Lacayo, who did not imagine that he was about to attend an unusual birth at 39,000 feet.
The woman named Abigal who had boarded the plane with her partner on a stopover in Managua, Nicaragua was assisted by the airline staff who, seeing the seriousness of the situation, asked if a doctor was traveling since they were about to give light.
Dr. Lacayo was sitting in the penultimate row of seats from where the emergency was located and presented himself as a volunteer, supported by Amanda Lacayo, also a Nicaraguan doctor who was traveling to a medical congress in Miami.
“I heard that a person was complaining in the back, then I went to see her and the flight personnel, who were three men, were assisting her. She positioned the patient at the end of the hall and I realized that she was in the delivery position. I asked for a pair of gloves and realized that the baby was coming on feet. We did the maneuver to evacuate the product and the most complicated thing was to free the baby’s head, ”she recalled.
“The girl was born pink but she was turning purple, she was not breathing because she was premature since the patient was only 27 weeks pregnant. We began to stimulate the girl with one of her arms supporting her head and with her fingers doing heart massages. We revived her and it took five minutes until we managed to get the girl to have a normal heart rate and to breathe on her own. Suddenly she began to cry. That generated joy on the flight because it did not go further, although the girl and the mother could have been complicated. I don’t know what would have happened to them if there had been no doctors, it would have been a tragedy, ”she added.
Dr. Suamy Bermudez suggested that the pilots of the flight land at the nearest airport since it did not guarantee that the girl would survive an hour and a half that was left to reach Miami.
Thus, they landed in Cancun, Mexico, being received by the airport paramedics and taking the woman and the girl to the hospital in that city.
The mother was hospitalized and two days later she was discharged, while the girl continues in the hospital’s intensive care unit and is doing well. She already feeds herself although she is connected to a mechanical ventilator. The baby’s parents are from the community of San Juan Rivas, Nicaragua and were returning to Miami where they reside.
They have shown their gratitude to Dr. Suamy Bermudez, who was traveling to Miami for a work meeting.
“I met with the family and they invited me to visit Nicaragua and they gave me a sweatshirt with my name embroidered and the flight number. It is a satisfaction to have saved the girl and the baby under the circumstances”, concluded Dr. Suamy Bermudez, who has a specialty in internal medicine and works at the Atlántida hospital and at a private hospital in La Ceiba.
