Are You An Organ Donor?

Here is an article written about my nephew Parker Seely who had a heart transplant May 31st. I think the message my sister in law Jessica really wants to get across is how important it is to be an organ donor and that by doing so you really do give someone else a chance at life... just like the family who chose to give Parker his second chance at life by giving a heart!


Parker Making Progress
Written by Sherri Gallant
Sunday, June 20 2010, 10:43 PM

Little Parker Seely and his mom, Jessica, are halfway home.
The 15-month-old, pink and healthy from the new heart thumping away in his wee chest, has recovered enough from transplant surgery to be allowed to move from Stollery Children’s Hospital in Edmonton to the Ronald McDonald House next door, the place that’s served as home for Jessica since February.
Mother and son will remain there, close to the hospital but in their own space, for at least a few weeks and maybe even for months, until he gets the green light from his medical team to return to Lethbridge. That will be a joyous day indeed for Parker’s dad Jim and his brothers Kaden, 5, and Brock, 3, who’ve been holding down the fort at home during their absence.
It’s been a long haul, but now there’s light at the end of the tunnel. And Jessica, after watching her son go through heart failure, two strokes and a million other ordeals, is filled with gratitude that another family, in the midst of their grief, saw fit to donate their child’s heart so another child might live.
“I really want to encourage people to think about organ donation,” she said from Edmonton. “Talk about it with your family. I would do anything to get people talking about it. It’s just so important.”
Parker was born with a defective heart which doctors planned to repair with a series of surgeries.
“He was supposed to be able to live with his heart after all that, but at six months he went into heart failure, and once that happens usually the function doesn’t come back,” she said. “He just kept getting worse, and finally we had to come into the hospital. Edmonton is the heart centre for western Canada. It’s one of the top three in the world.”
At seven months, Parker underwent his first open-heart surgery.
“He was still able to cope and function on his own with the help of some medications, but then, in January, he started to go downhill again and Feb. 19 I took him in to the emergency in Lethbridge and they flew him in the STARS helicopter to Calgary.”
After a week in Calgary, Parker was transported to Edmonton where mother and son have remained since. “The call” came May 30 with news of a donor, and hours later the little boy was in surgery.
Jim, a nurse at Chinook Regional Hospital, worked a reduced work week for a time and family members helped care for the other boys. Most weeks he was able to head for Edmonton on Thursday with Kaden and Brock, and return to Lethbridge Sunday night. When Parker wasn’t doing well, Jim went up alone, and family members would care for the boys in Lethbridge.
“Both of our families are in Lethbridge and they’ve been really wonderful,” said Jessica. “They’ve helped so much.”
Jessica’s routine has been to make her way from her suite at Ronald McDonald House to the hospital at about 8 a.m., staying with Parker throughout the day, until he’s asleep for the night.
“I just care for him,” she said. “I do all the regular mom things anyone would do - I feed him, change his diapers, put him to sleep. We also have echos (echocardiograms), and X-rays and different appointments that he has to go to. They’re very busy days and they go by quite fast.”
Parker is developmentally delayed because of his medical condition, which allows the family to qualify for subsidies to help with the cost of Ronald McDonald House and other expenses. They’ve planned for Jessica and Parker to be in Edmonton for up to the next three months, and are grateful for all the help and support they’ve received.
“From his first stroke, his right arm and right peripheral vision was affected, and his right arm is quite slow still, but it’s getting better. Then, with his second stroke, his left leg was affected. He couldn’t sit and he had to learn to stand again, but he’s doing really well.”
In addition to healing from the transplant and adjusting to the anti-rejection drugs, which at first made him vomit and gave him diarrhea, Parker undergoes regular physiotherapy, occupational therapy and speech therapy.
He got the last of his tubes removed Thursday, is now able to take his medications by mouth, and is eating like a lumberjack. At one point after the transplant, doctors allowed Jessica to see Parker’s old heart in the pathology department of the hospital. The organ was about three times as large as it should have been — as big as Jim’s fist, when it should have been the size of Parker’s.
“We’re religious people and we just have been almost dumbfounded by the support from people, people we don’t even know have been praying for him and for our family. It’s been so amazing. People wonder what they can do, and what we need. There’s nothing they can really do, but think about us and pray for us. Getting an e-mail from someone who says they’re thinking of us makes a bad day turn good.”

You can also read another article about heart transplants, berlin hearts and my nephew written for The Globe and Mail by clicking here