LOS ANGELES, Jan. 20 (UPI) -- The smallest baby ever born in California -- who weighed almost 9 ounces when born -- went home from the hospital Friday, hospital officials said.
Melinda Guido, the second-smallest baby born in the United States and one of the world's smallest surviving babies, was born four months premature Aug. 30, the Los Angeles Times reported.
The baby was so small she was about the size of a soda can and could fit in the palm of her doctor's hand, officials said.
Doctors decided to deliver Melinda by Caesarean section when a problem developed with the placenta, which gives the fetus nutrition, blood and oxygen.
Melinda spent the first months of her life in an incubator in the neonatal intensive care unit. A machine helped her breathe, and she got her nutrition through a feeding tube.
Hospital staff said they will monitor Melinda's progress closely for six years because children born this premature can suffer developmental delays and other complications, including blindness or deafness, the Times said.
