Maylin celebrates Easter in KY

As Maylin's foot heals, she continues to enjoy her first spring in the United States. Thanks to excellent donated wound care, her foot is healing very well. We hope she can be reunited with her family in Guatemala by late spring.

Imner prepares for cleft lip surgery

Baby Imner has recovered very well from his hernia surgery here in the states. His cleft lip repair is on the calendar, and meanwhile he is enjoying lots of formula and TLC. Foster parents Nicole and Chad have done a wonderful job of organizing surgical donations of care for this baby, and clearly, he is benefiting from the attention of dedicated medical professionals. COTA volunteers keep in close contact with Imner's parents to keep their concerns met.

Baby Imner in Guatemala, January 22, 2010

COTA pediatrician, Dr. Carol Cottrill, and Barb Buss, RN, worked closely together in Guatemala two months ago to support Imner's critical nutrition needs with donated formula, feeding technique teaching and assessment of his medical needs. Imner's immediate need was surgical repair of his large abdominal hernia. Our Children of the America's surgeons could not provide this service in Guatemala due to Imner's low weight.
The decision to bring the baby to the U.S. to receive donated surgery before his hernia became a surgical emergency.
Imner is seen below with new COTA foster mom Nicole. He has been in Illinois for a week, has adjusted well and is scheduled for donated surgery in two weeks. Nicole and Imner's mother in Guatemala communicate often.

Maylin hosted by COTA Volunteers Laurie and Mike

Maylin has adjusted beautifully to life in cold KY. After several weeks of medical care, she was ready to move to a more permanent foster home where she can continue her wound healing and improve her nutritional status. She is shown here with her new foster parents, long-time COTA volunteers Mike and Laurie.
Maylin had many loving and medically talented people in Lexington seeing to her needs before she settled in South Central KY.

Maylin comes to KY

Maylin was one of our Team 2010 patients who needed extra medical support following her surgery in January for a club foot repair. With the generous donation of a free airline ticket from American Airlines, a volunteer escort from the American Ambassadors Program, and the fast work of COTA Guatemalan volunteer Aida de Carcamo, Maylin was quickly transported to Lexington, KY where she is enjoying the special care of COTA medical volunteers.

Bianca returns home to Guatemala

Bianca was safely returned to her parents in northern Guatemala on January 10th. She had been the fortunate recipient of several sessions of donated sclerotherapy under the direction of her interventional radiologist in northern KY since last summer. The decision was made by her physicians to send her back to Guatemala in order to allow the hemangioma to heal. Although Bianca may need more care in the future, for now she is enjoying the the reunion with her family.

Bianca has a second set of injections

Bianca is in the hospital in Cincinnati as this is being posted. She had her second set of facial injections into her hemangioma this morning. Foster mother Jennifer (and Children of the Americas board member) reports that although she is not happy about being in the hospital overnight, Bianca is being a brave young lady.
Bianca has had this facial malformation for many years. Her determination to regain her health is only matched by her foster families willingness to help her do so. As you can see, she has plenty of spunk and spirit.

Jose's American family

Fourteen months of doctor's visits, hospitalizations, trips to the dentist, to the ER and to the OR, are memories now for Scott and Margaret, Jose's foster parents in TN.
COTA has been abundantly blessed to have the highest quality foster parents for our medically fragile pediatric patients. Most of our board member's have also fostered for COTA and we realize the responsibilities, emotional issues and joys of fostering a child that comes from a developing country with no English, in poor health and needing surgery. Jose and COTA were very fortunate to have Scott, Margaret and their daughters to share in his journey to recovery. They offered their home, finances, time and attention to Jose as if he were their own son.
We could not have asked for a better situation for Jose. The results are evident!

A brave little boy returns to Guatemala

Do you recognize the child in the red shirt ? The two photos of Jose that were taken while he was in the hospital in New York City show Jose just before surgery. Your financial contributions created the change that you see from the recent photo of Jose in the red shirt. What an amazing difference! The "angel" sitting next to Jose in the hospital is foster mother Margaret.
Jose returned to Guatemala yesterday. He had not seen his parents in almost 14 months. Maria and Carlos knew that COTA considered sending Jose home without surgery early this past summer, since the amount of money we needed to raise to obtain his surgery was so large. Their sincere requests asking us to try harder gave us the stamina to push forward. I think you will agree that the results were worth the effort!
I will see Jose again in January when COTA goes back to Guatemala for Team 2010. At that time he will be evaluated for further surgery. Dr. Waner wants to do a second procedure to take care of the neck mass that he was not able to repair (Jose could not tolerate a longer surgery due to blood loss).
Meanwhile, Jose is enjoying a reunion with his family, and as soon as I get photos of his experience, I will post them. Thank you for making this adventure possible for this special little boy.

Dr. Blaise Baxter and Jose

Post-op update on Jose

Jose's benefactors have been patiently waiting for post-operative photos of the surgery they donated. I have been reluctant to post any before now, as they were a little graphic. He had many stitches and was still fairly swollen for the first 5 days after surgery.
The photos below show Jose from 2 days ago. As you can see, he is still quite swollen and has a drain in his incision. Scrolling down to the post on August 12th will give you a comparison of how he looked before surgery.
The physician in scrubs with Jose is Dr. Blaise Baxter, who is one of the "angels" in Jose's journey to health. He donated seven interventional radiology treatments for Jose since September of '08, which were instrumental in the success of his surgery in NY.
What a brave little boy.

A letter from Sharon at Mayan Families in Guatemala

Thank you from Angel's mother.
Last year, Mayan Families helped C.O.T.A (Children of the America’s) organize a 17yr old boy to go to the U.S. for medical care. It took us a long time; almost two years to find the medical help that COTA so willingly and kindly offered for him. Angel had received a bullet to the jaw during an attempted car robbery. He suffered a broken jaw and had it wired together for over two years, his skin had started to grow over the wires. He had many rotten teeth and abscesses it was discovered when he got to the U.S.
COTA also found out that Angel's jaw was still broken after all this time. They repaired his jaw, his teeth and he was once again able to smile. He is now back in school and is a normal teen-ager again.
Thanks to the care he received, he is able to have his life back again.

Today his mother came with four beautiful hand embroidered wall hangings that she had made.
One was for Mayan Families, one is for Aida who works with COTA in Guatemala City, one is for Jody from COTA and the other is for the family that fostered Angel in the U.S. The mother made these beautiful embroideries herself.

This is a beautiful gift and I was totally surprised to receive it. These are Angel's little sisters and brother holding the wall hangings.

Jose is a brave little boy

Here is an update written by Margaret, Jose's foster mother who is at his side in NYC:

Lots of tears today from a weary and anxious boy who is tired of seeing herds of doctors around him and syringes and needles and blood. He's getting used to the tube coming out of his neck that goes to a bulb at its end and is full of blood. He sometimes tilts back his head and asks if there is any blood; he's still afraid of bleeding -- I think he's always known that's a danger. (Dr Waner told us at the office visit last Tuesday that the life-expectancy for this type of case left untreated would probably be 20 years old because of serious bleeding). They took out the arterial line and catheter this morning, so there are just the 2 regular IV's, and they use those to draw blood from for his lab tests. He is so afraid something else is going to hurt him, like an IV restart or needle stick, though we're pretty sure that's all in the past. Had some good pain med early this morning, but just plain old Tylenol since, and he says his neck and face do not hurt. He had a little oatmeal for breakfast, then a good serving of chicken and mashed potatoes from Boston Market across the street for supper. Otherwise just drank a lot of strawberry-kiwi juice from the corner market. I got out to the holiday inn after lunch time for a quick shower and to make sure they had extended my reservation til Monday. Then I picked up our "groceries", and got back up to his room. There is a very nice Child Life Specialist who sits with him and plays or watches a movie while I'm gone that hour each day. I'm sleeping here in the hospital, surprisingly well!

We walked a lot around the floor, around and around the circle. Sometimes Jose almost looked like he was sleep-walking. He denies any pain, just says he's tired. But we walked enough to get the extra fluids moving out of him and he started to pee a lot more and his hematacrit went from 19 last night (low) to 21.6 this evening. So no second bag of blood. No more lovenox - last dose of that was this morning at 10:00.

His anesthesiologist from the first procedure with Dr. Berenstein, Dr. Patti Brous, came up to see him and brought him a brand new Red Power Ranger outfit. Another special visit was Wed evening from an older Guatemalan lady and her husband. The woman had read about Jose in El Diario, a NYC paper, and she wanted to meet him. She came in carrying a copy of the paper with Jose's picture. She gave him a card and check for $20 for a new toy. I think her timing was very special: as she left she said a prayer over Jose and make the sign of the cross over him, giving him a little blessing. Jose has told me in the past that his mama prays for him sometimes and makes that sign, so it will be so nice for his mom to know that somebody was there to take her place at that the very night before his big surgery when she couldn't be there.

The right side of Jose's little face....it is a little face now. It seems so sweet and so little sitting on top of his still swollen neck. It's a little sunken, even, on the jaw there. They took out all the muscle and fat - and part of the nerve there - to make sure they didn't leave behind anything that might regrow. Big red line of stitches and steristrips going diagonal from corner of lips, halfway down neck, then all the way across neck from left to right. His lips are just a little pooched up on right, but I think they will come down. Dr Waner wants to fix the sunken part by adding some tissue there next time when he's back in to get the rest of the malformation removed. You kind of wonder, Where is Jose? Who is this? He hasn't looked in the mirror himself, and I don't think he wants to, but I imagine there will be some image adjustment for him to deal with as well because it's a big change. But he's proven to be quick and capable and very successful at making adjustments in life. And this is a wonderful one to have to make. What amazing skill in the hands of these doctors. What a life-saving and life-changing blessing for this little boy.

New blog design

Children of the Americas has had the benefit of many visitors to our blog during the medical journey Jose has made these last few weeks. In order to keep a fresh face for those that link onto our site frequently, we are taking advantage of a discount in a blog update being offered by our blog designer.
Nikki, from Canada, has designed our COTA blog as well as many others for non-profit organizations. She does this at a very reasonable price in order to raise money for her own volunteer relief efforts in the Dominican, Haiti and Ethiopia. It is inspiring to read about her work in her own blog:
http://www.madebynikki.blogspot.com/
Meanwhile, thanks Nikki for helping COTA reach all those who are interested in our work in Guatemala.

Our Guatemalan Assistant, Aida

Many people have asked about the logistics of bringing a child to the United States from Guatemala for donated care. The process is complex, time consuming and involves legal and pediatric assistance. The paperwork, airline flights with escorts, visa, B2 and foster care paperwork can take 3-4 months. The volunteer COTA board does the work from the U.S. end, but it would not be possible to work our medical miracles if it were not for Aida who has helped us for over 22 years on a voluntary basis in Guatemala.
Aida arranges embassy visits for the children that we bring out. She takes them to the Guatemalan pediatrician who donates medical screening. She meets them at the airport to get them safely on the plane and does the same again when they arrive home after surgery. Aida arranges CAT scans, post-care doctor visits, donations of formula to our cleft babies before they can travel, and most important, she keeps in contact with COTA stateside staff about the care issues involved in our patients. Since the year 2000, she has done this for 87 children who have traveled to the states.
Thank you Aida!

Maria returns to Guatemala

Maria, who has been hosted for a year in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, was flown back to Guatemala last week and returned to her mother. It was a tearful and emotional reunion of Juana and her only child.
Juana discovered Children of the Americas in 2006 when she first brought her daughter to our doctors seeking help for Maria's many congenital deformities. For five years Maria had a colostomy which was difficult for Juana to care for and to find supplies to care for. COTA supplied colostomy bags for this family over the last few years, but we were not able to perform the required surgery in Guatemala.
Following a successful year of care, surgery, immunizations, bowel training and dental care, Maria returned to her mother as a healthy little girl. Her foster parents flew her home to Guatemala and were able to relate to her mother the details of Maria's care. Aida, our Guatemalan coordinator, will oversee the details of a successful transition.
COTA is very fortunate to have volunteers committed to the needs of our pediatric surgery patients.

Jose successfully operated on

Following a five hour surgery today, Jose is resting well. He has 2 IV's, an arterial line, a foley catheter and a very large bandage on his face. His incision reaches from the corner of his mouth to below his chin.
Jose lost 700 cc's of blood during surgery and was given a unit of blood to compensate. His B/P started to drop, so the surgeons made a decision to stop their efforts to remove all of the malformation.
Margaret and I were able to talk tonight (her cell use is limited) and she sounds amazingly upbeat considering they have been in the hospital for 9 days. She is a short walk to the hotel where she is able to get a shower and change. She wanted me to thank all of Jose's benefactors for the amazing effort that was made on Jose's behalf.
Meanwhile, Jose's parents in Guatemala have had an anxious few days. They were concerned that the delay in surgery meant that the surgeons had changed their minds about helping Jose. They have been updated about the surgery and are very relieved.
More soon!