NRH Hospital Celebrating 50th Anniversary Three Times Over

NORTH RICHLAND HILLS (CBSDFW.COM) - A North Texas hospital came into existence in 1961. That year doctors delivered a set of twins.

This week, as North Hills Hospital in North Richland Hills celebrates 50 years of service, there's new life for a new generation.  For the first time in its history, the hospital has broken the triplet barrier.

Thomas and Jennifer Maynard are the lucky parents.  The couple didn't use fertility drugs to conceive, and triplets don't run in their family, so imagine their surprise when their doctor broke the news.

"He said there's three, there's three heartbeats," Jennifer Maynard said, "and I think I was in shock from that moment on."
All these months later, the Maynard's, who already have one daughter, Emma, who is four, welcomed three more, Kaylee, Lillian, and Mackenzie.

"It was the most amazing moment of my life," the proud mother said of the birth of her triplets, Tuesday.

It was a pretty amazing moment for North Hills Hospital as well.  It opened in 1961 with the birth of twins, but until now, the hospital has never had triplets.  "Fifty years later we move up a notch," said Debbie Cates, the hospital's director of women's services, "so no telling what the future holds, if we're going to get quads or not."

Because most triplets are born very premature, they're usually delivered at a hospital with a Neonatal Intensive Care Unit, or NICU, which North Hills does not have, but the Maynard girls withstood the test of time.

Even though they were still five weeks early, they are healthy; they have all 60 little toes and fingers; and three good sets of lungs.

The family is now preparing for some major adjustments come Friday, when mother and all three little ones are expected to go home.  "If we take the whole family anywhere we have to take two cars," Maynard said. "At first you feel overwhelmed that there's going to be three babies, but now that they're here, I wouldn't trade it for anything."