Home Check-Up

We heard from one of the midwives at the hospital that the hospital is designed to accommodate about 2000 births per year, but in fact handles closer to 3000 births per year.  They make it work by letting people go home the same day or the day after the birth, and then have midwives visit people in their homes quite a few times to make sure everything is going ok.

Since we spent so much time in the hospital, we were no longer eligible for the ‘midwife comes home’ program (you have to be discharged within 72 hours from the birth), but instead will be visited by the ‘Well Baby Program’ (ungbarnaeftirlitið).

Today was the first visit of probably two, and then we’ll start taking Ms. Bambino to the health center.

The nurse brought a lot of informative booklets (we don’t really know how the Icelandic system works) and went over the basics with us.  Then she checked Ms. Bambino out and gave her a clean bill of health.  She weighed 4060 g (8 lbs 15 oz), up from 3622 g (8 lbs) when she was discharged from the NICU eight days ago.