Mother of four gives birth to identical quadruplets

An Australian mother of four has become a mother of eight after giving birth to an extremely rare set of identical quadruplets.

Jenitar Na’amoana, 34, gave birth to the “one in 15 million” set of four girls on July 14 at the Royal Brisbane and Women’s Hospital via caesarean section.

Doctors believe the monozygotic quadruplets, where a single fertilised egg split into four embryos, were the first born in Australia who shared one placenta.

Ms Na’amoana was still breastfeeding her youngest child, all four of whom are less than 10 years old, when she learnt that she was pregnant with quadruplets.

Quadruplet pregnancies are extremely rare, particularly when conceived naturally, at about one in 677,000 births.

Dr Alexa Bendall, a maternal foetal medicine specialist who attended Ms Na’amoana, said the chance of identical quadruplets was even higher, at “one in every 15 million pregnancies”. But for all four to share the same placenta was “unheard of”.

Such pregnancies come with a substantially higher likelihood of complications, and Ms Na’amoana was admitted as an inpatient for monitoring at 25 weeks.

Dr Bendall warned the risk was “very, very high… there is a high risk of mortality and morbidity for these babies and for mum”.

At 28 weeks and four days, Emily, Harriet, Alexa and Catherine were delivered with no injury to Ms Na’amoana or the children.

A medical team of about 20 midwives, anaesthetic staff and neonatal teams were in the operating theatre.

All four weighed between 2lb 5oz and 2lb 8oz, in the average range for their gestational age.

They are expected to be kept in hospital until they have grown to full term, and the doctor is optimistic about their health.

“We always said that if we could get her to 28 weeks, we would be doing well,” Dr Bendall said.

“So the fact that we’ve got four beautiful, healthy babies born at 28 weeks and four days is incredible, and we’re very happy to be a part of it.”

Ms Na’amoana and her husband Jortham are appealing for donations to help buy a van to carry all eight of their children.

She wrote on her GoFundMe page: “Our four precious miracles have arrived safely, and while our hearts are overflowing with gratitude, the reality of caring for four newborns at once has brought challenges we never could have imagined… If you’re able to support our family, no gift is too small – every donation will make a real difference.”

At the time of writing, donations total 39,383 Australian dollars (about £20,550).

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