22-year-old Karla Perez reportedly went to the hospital with a severe headache when she was 22-weeks pregnant to discover that she had brain bleeding.
Perez, who was a mother to a 3-year-old girl, gave birth to a baby boy named Angel 54 days after she was declared braid-dead, according to ABC 7 News.
A team of more than 100 doctors, nurses and staff kept Perez alive just long enough to deliver the baby by caesarean section, according to the website 9News.com.au.
“Our team took a giant leap of faith,” Methodist Woman’s Hospital vice president Sue Korth said in a statement.
“We were attempting something that not many before us have been able to do.”
Before Angel’s birth, doctors reportedly had to closely monitor Perez because there was a risk she could develop infection or go into cardiac arrest, the hospital explained. Although the goal was to wait until Perez reached 32 weeks, little Angel had to be delivered by week 30.
The little boy reportedly weighed 2-lb., 12.6-oz. and is doing well as he is under the care of Perez’s grandmother and other relatives.
Perez reportedly suffered from rheumatoid arthritis and had been told from a young age that it would be difficult for her to get pregnant, according to her obstetrician Dr. Tifany Somer-Shely. Perez had given birth to her daughter with no major problems, which is reportedly why she went off her medication while trying to get pregnant this time.
Perez reportedly passed away two days after giving birth. Four of her organs, including her heart, were reportedly donated.
Perez’s family is reportedly keeping her things close to Angel so that her scent will give him comfort.
“We are cautiously optimistic,” neonatologist Dr. Brady Kerr stated of the newborn.
