'World's Smallest Baby,' Who Weighed Just 212 Grams At Birth, Goes Home [Photo]

A baby girl, considered the 'world's smallest surviving baby' at birth, has gone home after 13 months at the hospital. The baby weighed just 212 grams, just about the weight of an apple, during her birth in June 2020.

A statement by the National University Hospital in Singapore said the girl, named Yu Xuan, was delivered prematurely at just under 25 weeks through a Cesarean section.

The baby was so small that the hospital staff was baffled, The Straits Times reported. Zhang Suhe, an advanced practice nurse at NUH, said she could not believe her eyes when the baby was first wheeled into the neonatal intensive care unit.

"I was shocked so I spoke to the professor (in the same department) and asked if he could believe it. In my 22 years of being a nurse, I haven't seen such a small newborn baby," Zhang told the outlet.

Baby Yu Xuan's birth came as an early shock to her parents Kwek Wee Liang and Wong Mei Ling. The couple was planning to return to Malaysia for the delivery when Wong Mei felt abdominal pains and was rushed to NUH on June 8, 2020.

She was diagnosed with pre-eclampsia or high blood pressure, during pregnancy and was subjected to an emergency cesarean section.

"I didn't expect to give birth so quickly, and we were very sad that Yu Xuan was born so small. But due to my condition, we didn't have a choice. We could just hope that she would continue to grow (and be healthy)," she told The Straits Times.

According to the doctors, the child's condition was too frail that she had to be placed on a ventilator as her lungs were not well developed.

Dr. Yvonne Ng, a senior consultant, told the news outlet that they had to "innovate and find some improvised methods to deal with a baby this small because this is the first time we experienced somebody this tiny."

"She was so small that even the calculation for the medication had to be down to the decimal points."

The baby, now 14 months old, weighed a healthy 6.3kg when she was discharged on July 9. However, she still has a chronic lung disease and has to be on a ventilator at home for oxygen assistance. NUH doctors say she is expected to get better with time. Despite all that, baby Yu can turn on her own and is learning how to feed on a bottle.

The treatment incurred a mammoth hospital bill to the tune of $147,470. However, a sum of $221,205 was raised for baby Yu, thanks to a crowdfunding effort.

Before baby Yu, California-born baby Saybie was declared the world's smallest-ever surviving baby. She weighed approximately 244 grams at birth.