Two Heroic Robots

by Bruce Grimes

Two robots went to work at a hospital to help doctors with a heart transplant. 
Their patient was a newborn baby . . . two newborn babies, in fact. The babies were joined together at birth, and the robots helped doctors surgically separate the babies from each other. One of the robots worked to care for the first baby, and the second robot cared for the second baby.

Once the babies were separated, the doctors could tell that one of the babies had a bad heart. 

Meanwhile, their mother was doing poorly; she was on a ventilator to help her breathe. She had been in a car accident: Her car was sideswiped by a school bus as she was driving to the Weird Al concert in California. An ambulance brought her from the site of the car accident to the hospital. The doctors in the Emergency Room said, “We need to deliver this baby.” They rushed into the operating room and performed a c-section. The doctors were surprised to discover that it was twins! They were even more surprised when they realized the babies were joined together.
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“We need more hands in the surgery,” they said. “Let’s call around the city and see if we can get robot help.” It took two hours for the robots to arrive. The doctors had to program the robots to help with surgery. The surgery was big! It took 12 hours. The babies’ father was watching on-camera the whole time. He was nervous! 

Once this surgery was complete, the doctors began a heart transplant for the baby with a bad heart. The robots were good at doing heart transplants because they had done that surgery before. In the past, their patients were adults. This was a new experience for the robots, to perform a heart transplant on a brand new baby.

Their mother was showing some improvement, and fortunately she recovered completely from the accident. But she had to stay in the hospital for 12 months. 

The babies were transferred to Children’s Hospital. They stayed in ICU there for four months before they went home with their dad.  

The robots received gold medals for their heroic work. 

Both babies both grew up to be very strong people. One became a football player! The other became a doctor, and now he takes care of babies when they’re born. Sometimes, with robots.