New mom recovers from rare syndrome and Covid

Nagpur: Covid-19 period is full of heartbreaking stories where many people have lost their near and dear ones. But, timely hospitalization and skilled medical help are bringing out some heart-warming incidents too.
Recently, a new mother defeated Covid-19 and three different ailments together after a struggle of more than four weeks in city’s Krims Hospital.
Doctors said that apart from their medical excellence, the mother’s willpower and love for her newborn played an important role in this story of rare recovery.
The 32-year old, 8 months pregnant woman, living in Katni (MP) was referred to the city for Covid positive delivery in September when Covid was at its peak. After caesarean delivery, she gave birth to a premature baby. The baby was kept in NICU for five days. But soon after the delivery, the mother started having difficulty in breathing, speaking and severe generalized weakness.
She was immediately shifted to Intensive care unit (ICU) where she received cough cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) because of bradycardia and respiratory arrest.
Here, she was diagnosed with guillian barre syndrome and was also found to have left-sided pneumonia. Because of complete respiratory failure, she was put on ventilatory support.
“Such a scenario is rarely encountered in clinical practice,” said Dr Sameer Arbat, who treated the patient for Covid pneumonia.
“Covid patients requiring ventilator support fall into severe category. Any complication related to Covid in pregnancy is a big challenge for the doctors. It was 30 days of rigorous efforts put in by three specialities of Obstetrician, Neurologist and Pulmonologists,” said Dr Arbat.
The woman was gradually weaned off from ventilator after 28 days. Gradually, her health started improving. After 7 days, she was discharged from the hospital when she was able to stand with support and move the upper limbs.
“Body’s immune system is altered during pregnancy and response to viral infection can cause more severe symptoms. There is possibility of transmitting disease to baby also. Early identification and assessment of her symptoms played key role in her treatment,” said Dr Dipti Shende who was the primary doctor to attend to this case.
Neurologist Dr Anand Somkuwar who clinically suspected guillian barre syndrome as the cause of her weakness and respiratory failure, said its rare complication. “Guillain-Barre syndrome is a rare disorder in which your body’s immune system attacks your nerves. The exact cause of Guillain-Barre syndrome is unknown,” he said.