Hunter Thomas Reeve was born on March 12, 2009 at 2:38 in the morning at St. Thomas Elgin General Hospital. Hunter weighed 6 pounds and was four weeks early but appeared to be a healthy baby boy.Although Hunter was eating well he was steadily losing weight. Three days after his birth Hunter was released from the hospital and made the trip home. Due to the weight loss Hunter was brought back to the St. Thomas hospital and after a series of tests it was found that Hunter was severely dehydrated. An IV line was started in the top of Hunter’s head because he was too dehydrated for the nurses to find veins anywhere else in his body.Hunter was rushed by ambulance to the Children’s Hospital in London, where he stayed on the IV while doctors and nurses diligently tried to determine what was causing the dehydration. By this time Hunter was down to almost four pounds and struggling to stay alive. Hunter fought hard (even managing to rip out the lines that the nurses kept putting in) and was stabilized thanks to the staff in the Pediatric Critical Care Unit. Without their care Hunter would not have lived through the night.After exhausting all of the non invasive tests, doctors from many specialty units were brought in to try and find out what was causing Hunter’s illness. Dr. Bax of the Pediatric Gastroenterology team was brought in, and in Hunter’s first week of life, he had his first surgery. A sample of Hunter’s small intestine was obtained through a biopsy and sent off for analysis. This is a rare procedure to have done on a baby and is not part of routine testing. Miraculously enough, this procedure determined the cause of Hunter’s decline: his small intestine was not absorbing any nutrients from his food. In fact, Hunter was outputting more than he was taking in.Hunter was diagnosed with an extremely rare and potentially life threatening disease of his intestines called Microvillus Inclusion Disease (MID). This disease prevents Hunter from absorbing any nutrients through his small intestine making him completely dependent on Total Parenteral Nutrition (TPN). TPN is very hard on Hunter’s liver but the only other option is a small intestine transplant.At first it seemed like a very grim prognosis as the complications with transplant are many. But there is hope: an experimental treatment called Omegaven. Omegaven couples Omega 3 fatty acids with TPN which greatly reduces the risk of liver damage and may assist in its repair. Unfortunately, Omegaven is not currently covered by the Ontario Health Insurance Plan (OHIP) or independent insurance companies.This disease only affects one in five million people. Hunter is the twelfth known person suffering from this disorder in North America right now. Currently there is no cure for Microvillus Inclusion Disease. Hunter needs constant medical care and the cost can be overwhelming to a family. There is very little coverage for in home support for families battling MID; as this disease is rare it is not typically covered by OHIP. Although Hunter’s Omegaven is currently being paid for it is unknown how long it will remain covered and what challenges this little boy will face in the future. Because MID is such a rare disease more research is needed to find other treatment options that are not as detrimental to the health of those affected. Hopefully someday this research will lead to a cure. Hunter needs your help to stay home. With your support we hope to make this dream a reality. Please help – because every baby deserves to grow up.

Thursday, July 30, 2009

Please Join Us...

Please join us for a charity BBQ to support Hunter...

BBQ is at Shaw's Ice Cream,
6598 Sunset Rd, Central Elgin
Sat-Mon...11am-8pm

The weather should be nice so stop in on your way to or from the beach!!
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Sunday, July 26, 2009

The Price of Piece of Mind....

.....Is two days in the hospital......Hunter's 48hr cultures came back negatvie....thank God....it will take some time but eventually we will be able to distinguish between Hunter's "infectious" sounds as opposed to his non-infectious sounds.....for example he was making a grunting noise that many babies make at his age...but with Hunter...this can also be a sign of infection so we need to look at the frequency/consistency of his grunting etc..... we came home Saturday at 6pm.

As always Hunter's doctors and the hospital staff have been great, reasssuring us that it's better to be safe than sorry when it comes to his health...we also got to see the doctor who originally went in the ambulance with Hunter when he was rushed from St. Thomas to London when all of this began....it was great to see him since he was a huge part of saving Hunter's life....I wanted to express to him how much it meant to us to have a dedicated doctor taking care of our little man (even though its his job)......but there are really no words to express the gratitude we feel towards all of the doctors and nursing staff who have been involved in Hunter's care......what they do for families every day should not be taken for granted...
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Friday, July 24, 2009

Parents over-reacting?

Over the last couple of days Hunter has been "grunting" and vomitting. The vomitting seemed to go hand in hand with him having his small bottle each day. The last time Hunter had his infection we were told the "grunting" is a sign of infection for him. It didn't seem to be as bad as the previous time but we started to get ourselves worked up about it to the point where I felt sick to my stomache. Could have been me thinking about the worst case scenario of what it could mean for Hunter if he had the same infection or it could have been me thinking about going back to the hospital! Either way, we decided to bring him in......I cried the whole way to the hospital of course. He has been admitted for 2 days as a precaution. His blood work last night showed his white blood cell count to be normal which is encouraging. He could still have an infection but we'll know for sure within the next 48hrs when the cultures come back.

Once we were at the hospital I felt much better...whether it was knowing we would know for sure if he had anything or the comfort of his primary workers being there when we got there...I don't know....
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Friday, July 17, 2009

Follow up appointment

Hunter had his follow up appointment today. We had to wait 40 minutes after our scheduled start time for them to even start the appointment...not great for a fussy 4 month old....fortunately Hunter's white blood cell count was normal meaning it would be unlikely for his cultures to grow over the next 48hrs....his hemoglobin is normal as well meaning the iron they put into his TPN is working.

Dr A thought Hunter looked great! We think he's started teething since we went through 2 days of what felt like non stop crying. Nothing breaking the gum line but you can see the bumps!
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Saturday, July 11, 2009

Home at Last....Again....

We made the trip home with Hunter this morning....it is great to have him back here. Hunter's doctors are looking at starting something new to help alleviate line infections. They put alcohol in the line and then extract it to clean it....this has proven to reduce/eliminate line infections. It'll be a couple of weeks before we start this since Hunter still has to get the all clear in the next two weeks that his original infection hasen't grown back.
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