In her third trimester, Dakota developed a rare placental condition and was flown to Calgary from her home in Medicine Hat to deliver baby Truett at 34 weeks. Truett suffered a pneumothorax (collapsed lung) and was intubated after birth. As he was born prematurely, his little lungs were not done developing, making him extra susceptible to illness and infection. He stayed in the Neonatal Intensive Care Unit (NICU) at the Foothills Medical Centre for a couple of weeks until he was stable enough to be transferred to Medicine Hat Regional Hospital for another two weeks and eventually, home for the first time.
After several weeks at home, Truett became very sick. Dakota took him back to the hospital in Medicine Hat, where his breathing deteriorated. “The doctor wanted to consult with the team at the Alberta Children’s Hospital and after showing them some videos of his breathing and combined with his history, they decided it was best to send him to Calgary ASAP,” she says.
Thanks to community support, the Alberta Children’s Hospital is home to the Pediatric Critical Care Transport team, which travels to other hospitals to provide specialized care for seriously ill or injured children and bring them to Calgary. The transport team arrived in Medicine Hat via fixed-wing airplane and were quickly able to intubate baby Truett. “You’re worried and scared and a little numb as all this is happening,” says Dakota. “But I was comforted knowing this team knew exactly what they were doing.” It turned out Truett was fighting three separate respiratory illnesses: RSV, pneumonia and bronchitis.
After Truett was intubated, the team carefully wrapped him up cozy and warm in a blanket. There was something especially tender and reassuring about that, says Dakota, seeing her baby so gently tucked in and safe in their arms. She flew along with the team to Calgary, while they monitored Truett’s vitals. There was also comfort in knowing if anything should take a turn for the worse en route, Truett had pediatric critical care experts by his side.
At the Alberta Children’s Hospital, Truett was admitted to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) where he remained intubated for two weeks. During his time there, the intensive care experts noticed he was experiencing seizures – Dakota says this is believed to be from his brain ‘short-circuiting’ due to how hard his little body was trying to fight off all the illnesses – and he also developed a blood clot in his central line. However, thanks to the intensive care experts and the right combination of medications, Truett slowly began to improve and was eventually able to come off the ventilator and move to the unit to continue recovering.
While he’s still followed by neurology and has experienced a few delays due to his traumatic start in life, Truett is home and hopefully done with life-threatening hospital admissions! Dakota is so thankful for the transport team, who safely got Truett where he needed to be so quickly, and also for the many experts and caregivers at the hospital who helped get him healthy enough to finally be home with his family.
