Baby Wang Update

Baby Wang arrived in mid-January in critical condition. This little one was abandoned with ambiguous genitalia, but his most urgent problem was a history of constant vomiting and severe dehydration. The orphanage was located in a remote area without access to a high standard of medical care. They had the baby admitted to the hospital, but after several weeks they still had no diagnosis or treatment plan. Not knowing what else to do, the baby was discharged back to orphanage care. It became clear after several days that the orphanage was unable to deal with the severity of this baby's problems, so they asked if we might help.

We agreed to accept the baby and transferred to our main medical home at once. When little Wang arrived, he was already 6 weeks old, but was barely over 5 lbs. When we discussed this baby with our medical consultants, the baby's unusual symptoms (ambiguous genitalia and severe malnourishment and dehydration) rang a bell with one pediatrician. She suggested we see if this might be something called congenital adrenal hyperplasia.

Because the test for this condition is both expensive and difficult to obtain here, doctors recommended that we assume this was the problem and treat as such. Baby Wang began drug treatment for the adrenal hyperplasia and has been under the watchful eye of an expert dietician who is working to combat many weeks of malnourishment.

We are delighted to say little Wang has responded wonderfully, which confirms the doctor's suspicions of the original diagnosis. At this point it is still unsure if Wang is actually a boy or a girl, but chromosome testing later will answer this question. For now, we are just so glad that Wang is on the road to a normal and healthy life. See how much he has changed!