Naperville doctor delivers baby on plane

Dr. John Saran never thought he'd be happy to hear a crying child on a plane.

That was until Friday when the Naperville man helped deliver a 5-pound baby boy in the back of a Southwest Airlines jet on its way from Chicago to Salt Lake City.

"We were happy to hear a crying child because it meant by all practical purposes the baby was healthy," said the internal medicine specialist from Naperville's Edward Hospital and MDVIP.

Obstetrics is not Saran's specialty. In fact, he hasn't been directly involved in the birth of a child for 35 years when he was in medical school.

"My wife was poking me in the arm as I was dozing off that the pilot was looking for someone to help with a woman going into labor," Saran said.

He was the only doctor on board, and with the help of two nurses - one who worked in psychiatry and another who worked in pediatrics - they helped the woman deliver the boy about a month before the due date.

According to the company's Web site, Southwest Airlines encourages all pregnant women to check with their doctors before flying, and strongly recommends against doing so after the 38th week, or two weeks before the due date.

"I was just praying that the baby was going to present normally and fortunately for everybody's sake it did," Saran said.

After about three pushes, the baby was announced as the flight's newest passenger as the plane erupted in applause.

"The poor mother really does all the work," he said. "I don't even know her name, it happened so quickly."

Saran said the baby wasn't the woman's first, which likely helped expedite delivery.

"She wasn't screaming or anything until the baby was coming," he said. "I thought we might make it, but somewhere over Colorado the baby's head appeared and I knew we were going to have the baby on the plane."

Because of the strict airline carry-on rules these days, the makeshift medical crew was without anything sharp to cut the umbilical cord, let alone perform any surgical maneuvers that might have been necessary if the baby had been born in distress. Saran used his shoestrings and one of the nurse's hooded sweatshirt drawstrings to tie off the umbilical cord.

One of the children on the flight donated a blanket for the newborn since airline blankets aren't really known for their comfort, Saran said.

The flight was diverted to Denver where paramedics met the baby and mother and whisked them away to the Medical Center of Aurora, outside Denver, where officials later reported that the mother and baby were doing fine.

After an hour and a half in Denver, Saran and other passengers had their luggage taken to another plane they boarded and finished their way to Salt Lake City.

It was supposed to be a relaxing getaway weekend for the doctor and his wife at Sundance with no cell phones or computers, but after arriving in Utah Saran was greeted at baggage claim by a throng of reporters and woke up at 4 a.m. today to do tapings with the Today Show and Good Morning America.

However, Saran expects to salvage the remainder of the weekend now that he's caught up on all his media requests.

"I think I'm all set now for the weekend," he said. "It's a happy ending for everyone."

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