Our baby was started on caffeine shortly after his birth. One of many things I didn't know was a possibility prior to giving birth prematurely. The pediatrician explained that it would help to regulate his breathing and increase his heart rate, mainly to prevent periods of apnea (where the heart rate decreases to a dangerous level). My son had a few episodes of apnea which resulted in the alarms going off and a number of nurses rushing over to his incubator in order to shift and rub him until his heart rate increased once again. Giving him caffeine apparently stimulates the heart and increases its rate. This made sense as I imagined my husband getting his 'caffeine boost' from coffee each morning, but still seemed crazy to be giving to someone so young and small. I was assured that he would be 'off' the caffeine in a few weeks and would not become addicted to it as I feared.
Our baby also had jaundice which is apparently very common in full-term babies, and even more so in premature infants. He had a bit of a yellow look to him and needed to be placed under lights for therapy. He was given a tiny little headband that covered his eyes for protection from the lights. At the first hospital the light was long and narrow and did not cover his full body at once; the second hospital's seemed to be a little fancier with full body, and incubator, coverage.
I kept thinking that it would have been nice to have been provided with some, or any, of the information during prenatal classes that we were forced as parents to learn quickly following the sudden and expected early birth of our son.
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