06/13/2022
WOW! Amazing. And so sad that they were put on a display.
Author's note:
I am working on the Multiple Gestation chapter of my upcoming book and wanted to share this sidebar on the fascinating story of the Dionne Quintuplets.
The Dionne Quintuplets were born unexpectedly in an Ontario farmhouse in 1934. Before their birth, there had been only 32 recorded cases of quintuplet deliveries, and none of these infants survived as long as 2 months. It is astonishing that they and their mother survived. Elzire Dionne, age 26, had delivered her 6 prior children at home with no prenatal care, including an impacted frank breech presentation. In May, 1934, she was approximately 29 weeks of gestation when she experienced signs and symptoms of what would today be diagnosed as severe preeclampsia (systolic blood pressure greater than 200 mmHg, proteinuria, severe pitting edema, vomiting, blurred vision, oliguria). Dr Allen Roy Dafoe evaluated Elzire and put her on strict bedrest. He did not suspect multiple gestation.
Sixteen days later, Dr Dafoe (who had been up all night with another obstetric case), was summoned to the farmhouse. He arrived to find that two babies had been born, a third was delivering, and two neighbors were serving as impromptu midwives. The last two of the quintuplets were born en caul. The placenta was single with no separation into sections and sprouted 5 cords of varying lengths (the girls were later determined to me monozygotic). Elzire had a massive postpartum hemorrhage and went into shock with “the appearance of a dying woman.” As the father “had disappeared” the doctor was required to fetch the priest for last rights, “'reluctantly leaving the midwife holding the fundus” – but upon his return Elzire’s condition was improving.
The babies, all girls, were wrapped in old napkins and bed sheeting and were placed in a basket on the corner of the bed and covered with a warm blanket. They were not expected to live. Neonatal intensive care units were not yet an option, and the first antibiotics were not available until the 1940s. There were no scales that could weigh the babies individually, but together they weighed 13 lb 6 oz. Before the third day, there was no incubator available, so hot water bottles were used to maintain warmth. The babies were fed nothing for the first 25 hours but drops of warm water from an eye dropper. Then they were started on “7-20 mixture" --cow's milk, boiled water, two spoonsful of corn syrup, and one or two drops of rum. By day 5 they were drinking donated breast milk. When the girls were a year old, the provincial government of Ontario removed them from their home (ostensibly to protect them from germs, potential kidnappers, and exploitation) and placed them on public exhibition in a sideshow-type exhibit called Quintland. Quintland earned the Ontario province $500 million in less than 10 years.
Text source: Dafoe, A. R. (1934). The dionne quintuplets. Journal of the American Medical Association, 103(9), 673-677. (quote is on page 675). Image:Wikimedia commons
