{"id":158418,"date":"2025-07-26T18:22:09","date_gmt":"2025-07-26T18:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/worlds-most-premature-baby-celebrates-first-birthday-the-guardian\/"},"modified":"2025-07-26T18:22:09","modified_gmt":"2025-07-26T18:22:09","slug":"worlds-most-premature-baby-celebrates-first-birthday-the-guardian","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/worlds-most-premature-baby-celebrates-first-birthday-the-guardian\/","title":{"rendered":"World\u2019s most premature baby celebrates first birthday – The Guardian"},"content":{"rendered":"

Nash Keen, born at exactly 21 weeks, 133 days ahead of his mother\u2019s due date, has been recognized by Guinness World Records
An Iowa toddler who was born when his mother was less than five months pregnant isn\u2019t only the most premature baby recognized by Guinness World Records<\/a> after recently turning one.
As his mother, Mollie Keen, put it, Nash Keen is also \u201cvery determined, curious \u2026 and he\u2019s just all smiles all the time\u201d after surviving against what Guinness described as \u201cphenomenal odds\u201d.
\u201cNash is going to be able to \u2026 say, \u2018You know what? I came into this world fighting,\u2019\u201d the boy\u2019s father, Randall Keen, said in an interview that Guinness published Wednesday. \u201c\u2018And I\u2019m going to leave fighting.\u2019\u201d
The organization\u2019s database of about 40,000 records has long inspired fascination from the public. And Nash\u2019s path to that database began on 5 July 2024, when he was born at the gestational age of exactly 21 weeks in the University of Iowa<\/a> Health Care Stead Family Children\u2019s hospital in Iowa City.
Nash\u2019s birth came 133 days ahead of Mollie\u2019s expected due date, based on a typical full-term pregnancy of 280 days, an article on guinnessworldrecords.com<\/a> said.
His birth was the second time in less than two years that Mollie had given birth prematurely. She recounted how she and Randall lost their daughter, McKinley, after she was born at a gestational age of nearly 18 weeks.
After the couple became pregnant with Nash, \u201cwe were so excited, but also very nervous,\u201d Mollie said. \u201cWe didn\u2019t get our hopes up.\u201d
Nash weighed only 10 ounces (283 grams), which is about the size of a soap bar, when he was born. He had to spend the next six months in the hospital\u2019s neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) before he was allowed to go home in January to Ankeny, Iowa.
Mollie recalled to Guinness that she and Randall \u201cweren\u2019t sure if he\u2019d even survive those first critical hours. But we wanted to give him the best chance.\u201d
The baby underwent \u201chighly specialized care, constant surveillance and frequent monitoring\u201d while he faced a series of substantial \u201cchallenges early on\u201d, Dr Amy Stanford \u2013 a neonatologist who helped care for Nash \u2013 told Guinness.
Yet \u201che showed remarkable resilience,\u201d Stanford added. \u201cAfter those first few extremely delicate weeks, he began to make steady progress, which was truly extraordinary to witness.\u201d
As the Associated Press noted<\/a>, Nash\u2019s story illustrates the growing number<\/a> of extremely premature infants who are receiving life-saving treatment and surviving.
Nash emerged from his NICU stay with as good an outcome as could be hoped for by medical science, as his doctors see it.
At just over a year old, Nash still required oxygen to help him breathe, and he was nourished exclusively through a feeding tube. His parents had been preparing for him to try pureed foods.
Nash\u2019s doctors were optimistic that a minor heart defect would resolve itself as he grew up. And he was not quite yet crawling, though he had started rolling over.
None of those developmental realities had barred him from demonstrating his budding personality, Randall told Guinness.
\u201cWhenever you call him \u2018Nash potato\u2019, or you cheer him on when he\u2019s trying to pull himself up \u2026 he just hams it up,\u201d Randall said. \u201cIt makes him want to succeed and do more.\u201d
A small gathering of family close friends joined Nash and his family to celebrate his first birthday. He was feted with new outfits, educational toys, diapers and the certificate from Guinness \u2013 now that he had beaten out by a single day the organization\u2019s previous most premature baby record holder, who was born in 2020 in Alabama.
Mollie told Guinness she and Randall are as happy as Nash has been.
\u201cI love waking up to him,\u201d she remarked. \u201cHe\u2019s truly \u2026 the best thing that could have happened to us.\u201d
AP contributed reporting<\/em><\/p>\n

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Nash Keen, born at exactly 21 weeks, 133 days ahead of his mother\u2019s due date, has been recognized by Guinness World RecordsAn Iowa toddler who was born when his mother was less than five months pregnant isn\u2019t only the most premature baby recognized by Guinness World Records after recently turning one.As his mother, Mollie Keen, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":158419,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-158418","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-world","entry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158418","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=158418"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/158418\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/158419"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=158418"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=158418"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/quixnet.net\/wpinstance\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=158418"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}