Baby Boom: 5 MacNeal Hospital Birthing Center Staff Members Pregnant at Once
January 22, 2023Categories: Loyola Medicine, MacNeal Hospital, Women's Health
BERWYN, IL – The staff at the MacNeal Hospital Birthing Center is experiencing a unique baby boom. Five nurses in the units that care for new mothers and their babies are expecting babies of their own in the coming months.
Nurse manager Heather Chavez, RN, BSN, and mother-baby nurse Vanessa Martinez, RN, are due at the end of January. Labor and delivery nurse Jannet Avalos, RN, expects to deliver in late February. Carolina Echeverria, RN, who works in the special care nursery follows in March and mother-baby nurse Alisha Lopez, RN, is due in July. Together they're expecting three boys and two girls.
"It’s so different when you're the one that's pregnant," said Alisha Lopez. "I'm used to taking care of women after they've had the baby. So it's definitely different being the pregnant one."
Chavez, who is expecting her third boy, will be the first one to deliver. She says planning for the various maternity leaves has been smooth because only one nurse from each unit will be gone at a time. "There will be staff here to take care of everyone!"
MacNeal Hospital recently celebrated the mothers-to-be by throwing them a baby shower. Veteran nurse Mary Jo Kron who has worked in labor and delivery at MacNeal for 34 years remembers an even bigger boom 14 years ago when seven nurses were pregnant at once.
Photos of the mothers-to-be can be found at this link.
About Loyola Medicine
Loyola Medicine, a member of Trinity Health, is a nationally ranked academic, quaternary care system based in Chicago's western suburbs. The three-hospital system includes Loyola University Medical Center (LUMC), Gottlieb Memorial Hospital, MacNeal Hospital, as well as convenient locations offering primary care, specialty care and immediate care services from nearly 2,000 physicians throughout Cook, Will and DuPage counties. LUMC is a 547-licensed-bed hospital in Maywood that includes the William G. and Mary A. Ryan Center for Heart & Vascular Medicine, the Cardinal Bernardin Cancer Center, the John L. Keeley, MD, Emergency Department, a Level 1 trauma center, Illinois's largest burn center, the Nancy W. Knowles Orthopaedic Institute, a certified comprehensive stroke center, transplant center and a children’s hospital. Having delivered compassionate care for over 50 years, Loyola also trains the next generation of caregivers through its academic affiliation with Loyola University Chicago’s Stritch School of Medicine and Marcella Niehoff School of Nursing.
For more information, visit loyolamedicine.org. You can also follow Loyola Medicine on LinkedIn, Facebook, Instagram or X (formerly known as Twitter).
About Trinity Health
Trinity Health is one of the largest not-for-profit, faith-based health care systems in the nation. It is a family of 127,000 colleagues and more than 38,300 physicians and clinicians caring for diverse communities across 26 states. Nationally recognized for care and experience, the Trinity Health system includes 93 hospitals, 107 continuing care locations, the second largest PACE program in the country, 142 urgent care locations and many other health and well-being services. In fiscal year 2024, the Livonia, Michigan-based health system invested $1.3 billion in its communities in the form of charity care and other community benefit programs. For more information, visit us at www.trinity-health.org, or follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, and X (formerly known as Twitter).