– It feels like these babies are a bit forgotten.

More than 140 employees have signed a warning letter to Rikshospitalet management: “The unsustainable conditions in the area” create great challenges for effective infection control for premature babies. The hospital management responds that medical treatment is justifiable.

– The apartment is so crowded that we are used to hiding things and sometimes we have to get under cables. When cesarean mothers go to be with their baby, we can only make room for the bed, says Heidi Haugen, a nurse in the neonatal intensive care unit for more than 20 years.

Haugen and his colleague Stine Hallen are two of 144 nurses and doctors in the neonatal intensive care unit, and some former employees, who sound the alarm on behalf of the babies in the Rikshospitalet neonatal intensive care unit.

An open letter warns the hospital director and the chairman of the board that the current situation in the area creates great challenges for the care of families in crisis, the need for peace for patients and effective infection control.

– Risk of transmission of infections

Children carrying multidrug-resistant bacteria have been admitted for long periods.

These should have been isolated in their own rooms, but today they are with children who are not carriers of the infection with the risk that entails transmission of the infection and potentially serious disease.

Additionally, employees write, “Could the reason our patients never have priority when areas are available be that they themselves cannot tell their disorders in language that administrators understand?”

The employee action comes a couple of weeks after the department’s chief physician Atle Moen announced that some sick babies are being unnecessarily medicated against stress and suffering from psychosis. Moen had first written an article in Aftenposten in response to a discussion post from a new father.

The hospital and ward management responded at the time that the patients were “properly cared for”, that “medical treatment is the best” and that “it is tight, but safe in the Rikshospitalet neonatal intensive care unit.”

Scream on behalf of the children

Now, Medical Director Moen is getting massive support for his concern.

– When I see how much more space they have in other rooms and that they have doors that can be closed to give patients peace, I think of our most vulnerable patients. Babies lying so tight, with noise and stress all around them. We know precisely these babies need peace, says Stine Hallen.

– If you think about the principle of equality, it feels like these babies are a bit forgotten, he adds.

Management: – The medical treatment in the department is solid.

The hospital management has been presented with the new criticism in the appeal and in Aftenposten’s interview with employees. Management responds to Medical Director Hilde Myhren and argues that the medical treatment in the ward is robust, yet narrow, and that “treatment is provided with a high professional standard that safeguards patient safety.”

Myhren acknowledges, in an email, that management agrees that conditions could be better and acknowledges that “we are not entirely in line with the needs of the department.”

It is noted that the neonatal intensive care unit was expanded with two new separate patient rooms in 2019, and the ventilation of two isolates was updated.

Myhren points out that the management is in dialogue with the clinic and will return with various measures.

– It must be possible to improve conditions

Nurses Haugen and Hallen say they are not naive enough to think they will have a new large room, but they point out:

– When we saw how quickly they managed to reassign premises when there was a pandemic, we thought that it must be possible to improve the conditions of these patients.

The two nurses do not disagree with the direction that it is medically justifiable in the department, but they believe there is a distance between “medically justifiable” and the Oslo University Hospital’s own motto “only the best for the little ones”.

– It is with great regret that we turn to the media, but in order to be able to turn my back on myself, patients and their families, I must know that I have done what I could to speak, says Hallen.

– Our patients cannot speak for themselves, therefore someone else must speak for them, says Haugen.

– We often have to ask parents who are sitting with their baby to come out

The nurses also see that parents have to suffer in the crowded conditions.

– As health personnel, we have a duty of confidentiality, but it is difficult with such a small place. We constantly have to ask parents who are sitting with their children to come out, says Hallen.

Haugen nods and adds that both babies and parents need to be together a lot, especially in such a vulnerable situation.

But because the babies are so close and the space is so tight, there isn’t much room for private moments, says Haugen.

The hallway describes a busy work day with a lot of noise, people coming and going, appliances, and alarms.

– When I come home from work, I am happy to have peace around me. But then I think of the babies lying in the wards for days and weeks, sometimes months, says Hallen.

Management has pointed out that a new, modern ward can only be realized through large new buildings, i.e. a new hospital around 2029.

The staff responds: We can’t have it like this for 10-15 years! They ask the management to begin “immediately” the work of solving what is perceived as “an unsustainable area situation.”