Rare Treat: Identical Quadruplets

Quadruplets are unusual enough. To have identical quadruplets, that only happens every 1-in-11 million births.

But early Monday morning, at Sutter Memorial Hospital, Ornsee Khamsa and Verek Muy welcomed four identical quadruplet girls into their family.

About 500 sets of quadruplets are born each year, according to the National Center for Health Statistics. But an identical set has only happened a handful of times in recent history, according to Jennifer Cassidy, a Canadian who maintains a Web site devoted to multiple births.

Cassidy said she is aware of only 26 sets of identical quads born since 1930, 17 of them female.

What is also unusual is that the four newborns were conceived "spontaneously," or without the aid of fertility drugs, an extremely unusual situation in cases of "multiples," doctors said.

Born after only about 30 weeks' gestation, the largest baby weighs 2 pounds, 8 ounces. The smallest is 2 pounds, 5 ounces. Khamsa, 22, and Muy, 20, who live with relatives in West Sacramento, named the babies Preana, Audreana, Natalie and Melody.

The couple plans to marry soon, they said. Khamsa and Muy also have a four-year-old son named Raymond. Told recently about his forthcoming siblings, he said he would prefer brothers.

Specialists will monitor the girls constantly for the first 48 hours in the hospital's Special Care Unit for signs of trouble, including respiratory distress and other complications common in premature infants. But doctors said that so far, they expect the four babies to be fine.