BABY GOT NOT ONE MIRACLE - BUT TWO.Byline: DENNIS McCARTHY Dennis McCarthy may refer to:
In the end, it came down to faith, because medicine wasn't saving 3- week-old Baby Reina. The infant's liver wasn't functioning, and the medical staff had done all it could, Dr. Sue McDiarmid told Reina's parents, Roger and Shinobu Watts. ``It was extremely dire,'' said McDiarmid, director of the pediatric pediatric /pe·di·at·ric/ (pe?de-at´rik) pertaining to the health of children. pe·di·at·ric adj. Of or relating to pediatrics. liver transplant liver transplant Hepatic transplant Transplant surgery A procedure that replaces a cancer conquered, metabolically defeated, or substance subjugated liver with one no longer required by its owner, many of whom donate same after an MVA Diseases requiring transplant program at UCLA Medical Center UCLA Medical Center is a hospital located on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California. It is rated as one of the top three hospitals in the United States and is the top hospital on the West Coast according to US News & World Report. . ``She was too sick to even try undergoing a transplant operation. This baby needed a miracle.'' She actually needed a couple of them. The first came that night in July 2002, after the doctors advised the young Simi Valley Simi Valley (sē`mē, sĭm`ē), city (1990 pop. 100,217), Ventura co., SW Calif. in an oil, fruit, and farm region; laid out 1887, inc. 1969. couple to make the most heart-wrenching decision any parent could possibly have to make. ``They told us to go home and decide if we wanted to take Reina off life support,'' Roger said. ``We knew what that meant: She was going to die.'' But before she could let Reina go, Sinobu told her husband, she needed one more night with her baby, one more chance to plead plead v. 1) in civil lawsuits and petitions, the filing of any document (pleading) including complaints, petitions, declarations, motions, and memoranda of points and authorities. with her to keep fighting. ``I wanted to think a miracle could happen,'' Shinobu said. ``My parents were here from Japan to be with us, and we all had said our goodbyes to Reina at the hospital during the day. That night my mother and I went back.'' Tomie Suyama and Shinobu sat by Reina's bed, carefully moving aside the tubes and lines that ran from her tiny body to the machine keeping her alive. They wanted to touch her, caress her. More important, they wanted Reina to feel them doing it. ``We sang her Japanese lullabies my mother sang to me as a baby,'' Shinobu said. ``We talked about the future, and how we were going to buy her a piano to learn to play because she had such beautiful fingers. We told her she couldn't die because she had so much to do.'' And they told Reina about her great-grandmother Toki, who was 100 years old and still alive, praying for her back in Japan. ``We named you Reina Toki after her,'' Shinobu whispered into her baby's ear. ``You have her good, strong genes. You can make it.'' The two women were still in the room when Dr. McDiarmid came in to check on Reina the next morning. The doctor saw something that stopped her in her tracks. There were little tiny drops of urine in the baby's catheter catheter /cath·e·ter/ (kath´e-ter) 1. a tubular, flexible surgical instrument that is inserted into a cavity of the body to withdraw or introduce fluid. 2. urethral c. tube that hadn't been there before. Reina Toki Watts was fighting for her life. ``I knew we had only a short window of opportunity to save her if we were lucky enough to get a healthy liver in time,'' McDiarmid said. ``It was a 24- to 48-hour period where she was stabilized just enough to make it worth the risk. Prior to that, she wouldn't have made it out of the operating room operating room n. Abbr. OR A room equipped for performing surgical operations. . ``It was still touch-and-go, trying to get a very little baby that sick through the operation,'' McDiarmid said. ``You just don't know Don't know (DK, DKed) "Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. .'' But the doctor knew she had to try. Baby Reina's name was put on the transplant list as ``Status 1'' on the evening of July 29. They had two days to find a donor liver. On July 31, just inside that window of opportunity, a liver was found. ``The fact that we got that liver in time is a miracle in itself,'' McDiarmid said. ``Because of confidentiality laws, we don't know who that family is, but the message I want to send out is, if people don't donate organs, miracles like this won't happen.'' During the transplant surgery, another miracle occurred. Reina went into cardiac arrest cardiac arrest n. Abbr. CA A sudden cessation of cardiac function, resulting in loss of effective circulation. Cardiac arrest A condition in which the heart stops functioning. , and doctors almost stopped the operation. But the baby came back. ``When an infant is that sick all the systems start to go into meltdown meltdown Occurrence in which a huge amount of thermal energy and radiation is released as a result of an uncontrolled chain reaction in a nuclear power reactor. The chain reaction that occurs in the reactor's core must be carefully regulated by control rods, which absorb , and that's what was happening with Reina,'' McDiarmid said. ``It was very dire.'' But the doctors didn't know what Shinobu and her mom knew. The baby on that operating table had her 100-year-old great-grandmother's genes. ``If you had asked me the night of the transplant the chances that Reina would be a normal baby, they would have been quite low,'' McDiarmid said. ``But she is a totally normal baby today, and that's a miracle after being so close to death so many times,'' the doctor said. Friday marked the one-year anniversary of the Watts' bringing Reina home from the hospital to live with her two siblings siblings npl (formal) → frères et sœurs mpl (de mêmes parents) , Taylor, 15, and Chelsea, 12. She's a healthy, 14-month-old baby now - a little young still to start those piano lessons, Shinobu said. But someday some·day adv. At an indefinite time in the future. Usage Note: The adverbs someday and sometime express future time indefinitely: We'll succeed someday. Come sometime. , she will. Dennis McCarthy, (818) 713-3749 dennis.mccarthy(at)dailynews.com CAPTION(S): photo Photo: Reina Watts, now 14 months old, here at home with family, survived a risky liver transplant after a night when her heart stopped and her kidneys failed. It is now a year later. Andy Holzman/Staff Photographer |
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