January 2015 Featured Child Post: Le

This month’s featured child is Le. Le came to us about a year ago in January 2014. Her story is slightly different, because instead of coming to us in need of surgery like most of the babies, she came to us needing post-op care. She had undergone heart surgery prior to her arrival. Her heart surgery was successful, but doctors were unable to extubate her, so she ended up needing a tracheostomy.   After the tracheostomy she was unable to return to her orphanage as they did not have the level of skilled care that she needed.

Le was 3 years old when she arrived at the Beijing Baby Home. She was not very stable and was very malnourished. In addition, to her heart condition she was born with down syndrome. She had very poor muscle development and was not even able to sit up.

We placed her in our isolation room to provide the best care for her. Her tracheostomy needed a lot of special nursing care. Slowly, we started to see her condition improve.

She started to develop her muscles. She started to sit up by herself and started to crawl! As time went by, she became healthier and stable.

About 4 months after her arrival, she was able to breathe well enough that the tracheostomy tube was removed.  She continued to grow healthy and bigger.

Now, she does not need any extra special care and so by the end of this month she is going to return back to her province, with the hope of her finding her ‘forever family’ soon.