Hospital to Get 2nd Incubator to Assist Ailing Newborns

In an effort to save the lives of critically ill newborn babies, a local charity will soon deliver an incubator that will be used to transport newborns to Ventura County’s only intensive-care nursery.

One of two incubators used by Ventura County Medical Center broke down in April, leaving the hospital with a potentially critical gap in its ability to deliver life-saving care. With as many as 90 premature babies taken into the facility each year, the hospital needs a second incubator in case more than one baby requires transport at the same time, said Dr. David Casting, director of the medical center’s Neonatology Clinic.

Casting said the incubators are equipped with everything needed to keep a critically ill baby alive and are used not only to transport babies from other hospitals, but to move them within the hospital.

“The incubator is really a mobile intensive care unit for premature babies,” Casting said. “It definitely saves lives.”

The incubator will be purchased by the Medical Resource Foundation, a local charity that supports the medical center. The foundation is just $12,500 short of the $70,000 it needs, said Millie Schofield, foundation executive director. It has received $37,500 from the Weingart Foundation of Los Angeles and donations from United Way of Ventura County and Rotary Club of Ventura South, she said.

She added that the donations were part of a fund-raising drive called Campaign for the Children 1993, in which the foundation intends to raise $275,000 to purchase the incubator and other equipment to benefit sick infants and children. Schofield said she hopes to be able to deliver the incubator by January.

“I’m a registered nurse and I remember when we couldn’t save a baby below four pounds,” Schofield said.

“Now they’re saving babies below one pound and 20 weeks premature. This will help give them life-saving care.”