After a month in the hospital, a baby girl whom doctors did not expect to survive has been discharged from the hospital and is resting at home with her family.
Now five months old, Christa Hunt was hospitalized with stroke-like symptoms and was experiencing countless seizures. After losing her heartbeat for 20 minutes, doctors were able to restart her heart and placed her on a ventilator. While her prognosis improved from being unlikely to survive to surviving with brain damage, doctors were unsure if Christa would ever open her eyes again and still don’t know an official cause for her medical struggles. She was taken off of life support on June 10, 2017 and was discharged about two weeks later.
“Christa is home,” her mother Sierra Hunt wrote on Facebook. “We haven’t had time to make a post. Just to clarify, she is still not opening her eyes. She’s still very irritable and has some issues settling down because of the brain damage. But she has been resting so much better at home than she was being messed with every hour at the hospital. Her journey is nowhere near over.”
After returning home, Christa continued to make progress, sucking on her pacifier, holding her head up, and even opening one eye. Due to the presence of blood behind her eyes, however, the ophthalmologist said regaining her eyesight doesn’t look promising. After about a week at home, Christa was taken to the emergency room due to spitting up and the risk of aspiration.
“We saw a GI doctor today and he said apparently she was supposed to see a GI dr before she was discharged (which she did not),” Hunt wrote on Facebook. “And she has been spitting up and is at risk for aspiration. He said babies with brain damage can’t handle the type of g-tube that has been put in to her. Apparently, there is a lot of lack of communication when it comes to the care of Christa.”
Christa recently received an EEG which showed no seizure activity and has been referred to more specialists. She will also be switched from a g-tube (feeding through the stomach) to a j-tube (feeding through the nose) in the next few weeks. While she still has a long road ahead of her, Christa’s progress is proof that doctors aren’t always right.
“It’ll take some time but I know with prayer things will work out for her good,” wrote Hunt. “She’s hanging in there. She’s very tired from having such a big day today. Her EEG didn’t show any seizure activity so that’s a plus! It’s still going to be a long road, but we went one step forward today! Thanks for the prayers!!”
