At least 17 nurses working in the same unit at Miami Valley Hospital in Dayton, Ohio, are pregnant at the same time, all expecting their babies before the year runs out — shattering a record previously set by the same team.
“It’s exciting,” Amberly Saner, nurse manager at Miami Valley’s labor and delivery unit, told ABC News on Monday, June 29. “We kind of found out over a period of a couple of months how many people were pregnant and it just kept growing and growing.”
The unit had previously made headlines when 11 staffers were pregnant simultaneously, according to a hospital news release. This time around, 15 of the 17 expectant nurses recently gathered for a group photo in their matching uniforms.
Some of the nurses are expecting their first child, while others are anticipating their second or more. Among them are Maddie and Rileigh, who asked to be identified only by their first names for privacy reasons. Maddie, 26 weeks along, is expecting her second child, while Rileigh, about 31 weeks pregnant, is also expecting her second.
Both nurses have worked at Miami Valley for five years and share a close friendship. “Maddie and I are actually best friends. So I’m planning on having Maddie deliver my baby,” Rileigh said.
Despite the wave of upcoming maternity leaves, Saner said staffing in the unit — which employs close to 200 nurses and support staff — isn’t expected to be significantly affected. “We have a lot of support nurses that can pick up [shifts]. We also have a lot of part-time staff that can pick up an extra day and so, we’re not too worried about the coverage,” she explained.
The pregnant nurses have been swapping tips and experiences with one another, with many looking forward to their children growing up together. “We’re all really excited and to be able to share this together,” Rileigh said. “This wasn’t like, our plan, but it just so happened to work out like that. We’re really just lucky to be able to go through this experience together.”
Saner described a strong sense of camaraderie among the unit’s staff, noting that many of the nurses are looking forward to assisting in each other’s deliveries. “It’s a really special bond between the nurses and I think they really enjoy being able to deliver each [other’s babies]. They’re just really comfortable and, you know, they trust the people that are in that room with them when they’re delivering and they just want them to care for them. So it’s a pretty cool thing,” she said.