Notable issues

September 4, 1947

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Rh Babe, Who Got New Blood Supply at Birth, is Healthy Now
Borrowed Blood in his vein, doesn't keep W. W. (Bill) Echols III from being a healthy baby. The month-old child, whose blood was replaced at birth with blood from a blood bank, is shown with his mother. He is an "Rh factor baby."
By Mary Crutcher
One-month-old Bill Echols is living on borrowed blood. And, he is doing all the good too.
His own blood-at least 75 percent of it- was drained from his body at birth.
As it was drained, it was replaced with blood from Methodist Hospital's blood bank.
The process, which involved the use of special tubing ordered for that purpose, took about two hours.
Reason for Bill's rather unique entry into the world is that he is an "Rh factor baby."
New Technique
He's believed to be the first infant delivered by the relatively new technique in Forth Worth. It was the result of planning that began when his mother first visited her obstetrician last February.
The baby's father, W. W. Echols Jr., an architectural draftsman, and his mother have conflicting bloods. Mr. Echols has Rh factor positive, and Mrs. Echols has Rh factor negative.
The fact that the parents have conflicting blood is not alarming in the event of first babies or if the person with Rh negative blood has never had a transfusion.
But in the case of Bill's parents, of 2501 Sixth Ave., the outlook was not bright. Their first child, a son too, was born dead Jan. 10, 1946.
Dates Back to '38
Doctors believe the cause dates back to 1938, when Mrs. Echols was stricken with a Streptococcus infection of the throat. It was necessary for her to have a blood transfusion.
At that time, transfusions were given with only blood types taken-doctors didn't know about the Rh factor, or a condition of the blood so called because it was first found in Rhesus monkeys.
Now it is known that 85 percent of the people in America are Rh positive (or have a condition in the blood stream called the Rh factor). Fifteen per cent are Rh negative-or lack that condition.
Mrs. Echols, an Rh negative, apparently was given a transfusion from a person with Rh positive.
Explaining the Rh factor, a doctor said that persons who are Rh positive don't have to worry about birth conflicts in transfusions or childbirth. If they are Rh positive, they can take either Rh positive or Rh negative blood.
How It Happens
But if they are negative and take an Rh positive transfusion, the lack of the Rh factor in their blood causes the blood to build up antibodies.
Antibodies in an Rh negative person might eventually cause death if given many transfusions of Rh
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(Starts on Page 1) positive blood. They would eventually tear down the kidneys.
An Rh negative father and an Rh negative mother will produce an Rh negative baby, and have nothing to worry about.
But when a man with Rh positive and a woman with Rh negative are to become parents, their doctor begins to go into the woman's history to see if she's had transfusions and reactions from them.
In a case like that here's what can happen: If the baby is Rh positive and some of the blood cells from the baby should work their way through the placenta and get into the mother's blood stream, it causes the mother to build up antibodies.
The doctor compared it with forces from one country invading another and the resulting battle.
"The antibodies have a tendency to tear down the positive cells," he said.
Just as the cells from the baby can get in the mother's blood stream, the antibodies can work their way into the baby's blood and start tearing it down.
During the last two or three months of the mother's pregnancy, the doctor takes tests at regular intervals to determine the concentration of antibodies in her blood stream.
If she has no antibodies, he knows that the baby is either a Rh negative or that there has been no exchange of blood.
If the antibody determination starts upwards (or increases) the doctor knows the prognosis for the baby isn't so good. Ten the pregnancy must be interrupted by a Caesarian operation.
Such was the case of Mrs. Echols. Increase of antibodies plus the fact that the obstetrician heard faint murmurs in the infant's heart brought about the Caesarian birth five weeks premature.
he doctor had been having specimens of the blood checked at Terrell Laboratories here and by some Dr. Phillip Levine with the Ortho Research Foundation in Raritan, N. J., which renders the service for doctors.
He consulted on the case with Dr. Joseph M. Hill, director of the William Buchanan Blood Center of Baylor University Hospital, Dallas, well informed on the Rh factor as the result of extensive research.
On the basis of a test made by the New Jersey doctor last May, fear for a successful delivery was expressed.
Naturally the doctors didn't give up. The obstetrician and a pediatrician worked together closely. They had Rh negative blood from the blood bank ready.
As soon as the Caesarean was completed, the pediatrician started work on the baby. With special equipment, he drew the baby's blood from his body slowly and replaced it just as slowly with the blood from the blood bank.
Bill, who has been formally named William W. Echols III, weighted in at four pounds, 15 ounces.
Born Aug. 10, he stayed in the hospital's premature baby ward until Aug. 30.
At home with his parents now, he weights five pounds, 13 ounces. His color is as good as any baby's. His doctors say he's as healthy as any premature baby.
His mother is the former Katie Lowry. His grandparents are Mrs. R. E. Lowry, 800 W. Morphy and Mrs. Della Echols, 1504 Fifth Ave.

Source: UNT