>MINNEAPOLIS (AP) – Four of five quintuplets born to a Sartell couple were off their ventilators Sunday at Children’s Hospitals and Clinics and the fifth was expected to have her ventilator removed within 24 hours.

Being removed from the ventilator is a sign that the babies’ lungs are developing well, said doctors working with the parents, Rory and Jessie Mrozek, and the quintuplets, who were born Thursday morning about three months early.

Jessie Mrozek is expected to be released from Abbott Northwestern on Monday. The babies likely will be hospitalized for several months, although doctors said Sunday that they are making remarkable progress.

“They’re all in very good shape,” said the quintuplets’ primary neonatologist, Dr. Bruce Ferrara. Specialists have said the babies have a 95 percent chance of survival, despite their early arrival.

“I would be very surprised if these babies don’t go home,” Ferrara said.

The babies – Nathan Dean, Breah Lynn, Jackson Nelson, Lainey Ann and Matthew James – weighed between 1 pound, 15 ounces and 2 pounds, 10 ounces at birth and were between 12 and 14 inches long. They have a 2-year-old sister, Kaylei.

Removal of the ventilators is one of several milestones doctors use to determine the babies’ progress. Doctors had worried about Lainey Ann, who was struggling to get enough oxygen when she was born. But they said Sunday that she continues to make progress and is quickly catching up.