Prognosis Good For Infant Born With Rare Heart Defect
PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - This week, KDKA-TV is featuring amazing stories from Children's Hospital leading up to the Children's Hospital Free Care Friends Telethon on Thursday.
KDKA-TV's Kristine Sorensen got the chance to meet a wonderful family recently. They are so upbeat, despite what they've been through and are grateful for the care their son has received at Children's Hospital.
Babies are naturally cute, but Judah Kaushansky is especially adorable.
Instead of his nursery at home, Judah's been in the Children's Hospital Cardiac Intensive Care Unit for almost all of his 12 weeks of life.
First-time parents Jessica and Nate learned soon after he was born, that their son has truncus arteriosus, which is a rare congenital heart defect.
"I had had a pretty uneventful, calm easy pregnancy so it was a shock," Jessica said.
Basically, Judah was born with one, instead of two, blood vessels coming from his heart. He needed surgery to fix it, and Children's Hospital is the only place in this part of the country that can treat this rare defect.
"They came in with such confidence, assuredness," Nate said.
Judah hasn't had an easy road since his surgery. In fact, just four weeks ago, he went into cardiac arrest. Technically, he died. His heart stopped. But, through the good work of the people at Children's Hospital, they revived him by giving him CPR for 45 minutes.
And to the surprise of even the doctors, Judah suffered no brain damage.
"It's amazing. It's very gratifying, but amazing to see Judah doing so well," Dr. Constantinos Chrysostomou said.
With such happy parents, Judah is a happy baby, despite all he's been through.
Judah's prognosis is great and doctors expect him to grow up like a normal kid.
The Kaushansky family has a website about Judah and his particular heart defect and encourage anyone in a similar situation to visit it. You can see it here: http://www.judahk.com/
The Free Care Fund Benefit Telethon is Thursday, Dec. 20.
Tune into KDKA-TV for live coverage.
Your donation will tremendously benefit Judah and all the kids at Children's Hospital.
Phone lines will be open from 3 p.m. until 8:30 p.m.
The numbers to call are:
- Local: (412)-692-8900
- Toll Free Number: (877)-522-2201
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