08-08-08
Twins set to start lives on auspicious day
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Riding the wave of enthusiasm over tomorrow's triple-eight date, a Honolulu woman plans to undergo a Caesarean section to give her twins a lucky birthday.
Twins Alex and Leo Tenev are scheduled for delivery at 7:30 a.m. at Kapiolani Medical Center.
"It's a very nice date, only once in a lifetime," said proud dad Nikolay Tenev, whose wife, Miya Yoshida, underwent fertility treatments.
HELEN ALTONN
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Twins Alex and Leo Tenev are expected to enter the world with lucky 08-08-08 birthdays tomorrow.
They are scheduled for delivery at 7:30 a.m. at Kapiolani Medical Center for Women & Children by Dr. Thomas Kosasa, medical director of the Pacific In Vitro Fertilization Institute and chief of reproductive endocrinology at the University of Hawaii John A. Burns School of Medicine.
The eighth day of the eighth month of 2008 is a special day for the Chinese, who feel number eight is good luck. In the Mandarin language, the number means "prosperity" or "fortune."
But the twins' parents are not Chinese. Mother Miya Yoshida is Japanese and father Nikolay Tenev is Russian.
"He just thought it was a nice date -- 08-08-08," Kosasa said. "We had a choice of several days when they could have safe delivery and safe babies."
It will be an extra-special birthday for Alex and Leo because of the Beijing Olympics, beginning at 8:08 p.m. the same day.
"It's a very nice date, only once in a lifetime," Tenev said in an interview. "I hope it means good luck for us, too. I like to think of it."
Tenev, 39, who has been in Hawaii 14 years, met his wife, 35, through friends at a Thanksgiving party. He works in construction, and she works at Duty Free in Waikiki.
They were trying to have a baby for a long time and went to see Kosasa for a fertility treatment. "She is lucky to have twins," Kosasa said.
"I'm thrilled," Tenev said.
He said they chose Alex as the name for one son in honor of Alexander the Great. His wife chose Leo because "it's (the sign of) a lion and it falls in that month (August)," he said.
Neither has family in Hawaii, but Miya's mother came from Japan to help, he said.
Kosasa said the boys will be his only Caesarean delivery tomorrow. Others are scheduled, but maternity wards at Kapiolani and elsewhere on Oahu are not overflowing despite the auspicious date.
Christina Turner, Kapiolani's Family Birth Center director, said five Caesarean sections and three induced births are planned.
Probably two or three of the eight are elective births, chosen because of the date, she said. However, she said, "it's not uncommon on a Friday, or uncommon for our department, to have that volume of scheduled C-sections or inductions."
She said there are circumstances in which patients ask to be induced when they are closer to term for family or personal reasons, such as a partner deploying to the Middle East. "They like to have the partner there for delivery," she said. Induced births also increase during school breaks, she said, with parents "working around family needs."
She said Kapiolani has not seen a trend reported on the mainland where mothers are scheduling Caesarean deliveries to maintain organization of their lives.
The Queen's Medical Center reports three C-sections and one induced birth scheduled tomorrow, which spokeswoman Nicole Pickens said "is very unique."
Typically the hospital has "two at the most," she said. "They try to keep it to one per day."
Kaiser Permanente's physicians and patients "have the option to make a decision to have a medically necessary Caesarean," and the Moanalua Medical Center averages 12 a month, said spokeswoman Lynn Kenton. But nothing is scheduled tomorrow, she said.