Sean C. Morgan
Sweet Home medics had just been watching training videos on obstetrics when they got a call from a pregnant woman ready to deliver on May 29.
“We had gone to the hospital earlier that day because I had been having contractions,” said Sweet Home resident Kaila
Hoagland, but staffers at Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital determined she wasn’t ready to come to deliver, so she went home a little before 10 p.m. She took a bath, and then she had to call for an ambulance.
Pain from the contractions was increasing, and she was dilating quickly, she said.
Medics were called at midnight, said paramedic Zach Lincoln. They weren’t too stressed at first, thinking they had plenty of time.
But things progressed faster than they expected. By the time they hit the Narrows, just west of Sweet Home on Highway 20, Lincoln told EMT intern Will Steinweg he’d better hit the lights and siren.
“We realized pretty quickly, we were probably not going to make it,” said volunteer EMT Ronnie Garcia, who has assisted on a couple of other deliveries over the years.
“I was hoping for drugs,”
Hoagland said. “I didn’t have enough time to get drugged.”
They delivered Eziraya Hoag-land at approximately 12:18 a.m. on May 30, before they could even reach the hospital. Steinweg drove the ambulance, while Garcia assisted Lincoln. They were on Park Street in Lebanon, just a couple of minutes from Samaritan Lebanon Community Hospital when the baby came.
“It was my first time around, so the adrenaline was going a little bit,” Steinweg said. He asked Lincoln if he should keep running lights and sirens.
This was Lincoln’s first delivery, he said. “Usually we’re like, ‘Get them to the experts.’ I just kept thinking to myself, if this isn’t one of the most natural calls I can go on.”
Eziraya was a little bluer than she should have been, Lincoln said, and he was worried a little. With a little stimulation, they got baby crying normally, and Lincoln knew she was all right.
“When we got to the stop light, he (Lincoln) said let the hospital know we’ve got two patients now, and we’re going to need some help,” Steinweg said.
Eziraya was almost three weeks early, Hoagland said.
Eziraya joins a big sister, Kaia. Eziraya’s father is Andrew Hoagland. The Hoaglands are both 20 years old, Andrew from Sweet Home and Kaila from Lebanon.
Earlier in May, Paramedic Eli Harris delivered a baby for the first time as well, although he had responded to a call several years ago when a woman delivered a baby in her car in the Narrows. That mother told paramedics that she didn’t know she was pregnant.
Harris also has responded to calls when complications have arisen during births handled by midwives.
On May 3, “we got a call at about 6 in the morning,” Harris said. Sweet Home medics were called out and then canceled when the mother planned to go ahead and travel to the hospital. Medics were dispatched to another call, and then Harris learned the expectant mother was coming to the Fire Hall instead of the hospital. Another call came in after that, and it was down to Harris and Keith.
When the woman, unidentified due to patient privacy law, arrived at the Fire Hall, Harris and Keith checked her, and she seemed stable. The baby wasn’t “crowning” yet, so they loaded her onto an ambulance.
“She said, ‘You’d better check that no-crowning thing. I think I’m going to have a baby,’” Harris said. They were in the Narrows, and Keith was driving. He pulled off the highway, but the baby was born before he even reached the back of the ambulance.
Had he seen the baby crowning at the Fire Hall, Harris said, he would have just kept her there for the delivery, Harris said.
“We think of it as a scary thing as paramedics,” Harris said. “It’s very uncommon for us to deliver babies; but it’s one of those calls where women have been doing this for thousands of years.”