An Unexpected Driveway Delivery
A NewYork-Presbyterian security officer springs into action to help a woman giving birth outside the front entrance of NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital.
It had been a quiet July morning for security officer Rubere Raffoul, who had just begun his shift at NewYork-Presbyterian Allen Hospital, when a person came into the lobby and said a woman outside was giving birth. Without hesitation, Officer Raffoul put on a pair of latex gloves and sprinted to the front driveway, where Leonela Valdez was in the backseat of a car, in the middle of active labor. Leonela’s friend, Paulino, was in the car supporting her, but there wasn’t enough time for them to get her inside.
Within a minute, Leonela had given birth with Paulino’s help and Officer Raffoul arriving in the nick of time to help receive and cradle her baby — a beautiful 7-pound, 7-ounce girl, Dhara Mariet Cepeda. “The baby cried and took a big breath and I breathed a sigh of relief,” recounts Officer Raffoul.
Security officer Rubere Raffoul visited mom Leonela Valdez and baby Dhara a few days after her birth.
As Officer Raffoul held the baby, care team members from the emergency department and labor and delivery quickly arrived. He then assisted Leonela and her newborn onto a stretcher as hospital staff wheeled them inside. Once the scene cleared, Officer Raffoul, who in his five years at NewYork-Presbyterian has now assisted in two births just steps outside the hospital, got right back to his regular duties.
“I’ve always been a ‘run into the fire’ kind of guy, so if I hear someone needs help, it’s no hesitation,” he says.
Leonela, already a mother of three, knew that the frequent contractions meant she had to get to the hospital, but “as soon as we turned onto Broadway, I was like, ‘I don’t think I’m going to make it.’” Thankfully, Officer Raffoul stepped in until the care team could reach mom and baby.
“It was a difficult pregnancy,” reflects Leonela. “So I was just happy that [Dhara] was out and we were fine.” Still in disbelief days later, she laughs when retelling her story: “Now it’s funny! What a memory, what a memory.”
As for Officer Raffoul, a father of two, it was hard not to think back to the birth of his own daughters. “I was actually having flashbacks to that time just holding the baby and there’s a lot of noise and movement, but it’s just you and the baby for that moment. It was as beautiful as it could be.”