10/29/2022 0 Comments Polio like disease healthnutHome therapy, outpatient therapy, and several return trips to inpatient therapy have provided an intense boost. He continued to work hard upon discharge. Polio like disease healthnut how to#While in rehab, we learned how to care for his trach and feeding tube and developed a home therapy routine for him. Therapy was-and continues to be-the key to Braden's recovery. For nearly six months, Braden worked amazingly hard before he could return home. When he was stable, he was transferred to a rehab facility. He needed a tracheotomy and ventilator to breathe for him, and a feeding tube to feed him. It felt like we were caught in a whirlwind and dropped into a new life-new setting, new language, new everything.īraden remained in the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU) for nearly two months. We soon sought out parents for advice and began advocating for treatments and therapy. We learned that AFM is a rare, polio-like disease that causes limb weakness and paralysis following a cold. We had never heard of acute flaccid myelitis (AFM) before Braden's diagnosis-and none of his doctors had ever treated a child with AFM. It was there that we got the diagnosis of acute flaccid myelitis. He was intubated and life-flighted to a major hospital. Five days later, the paralysis reached his diaphraghm and he stopped breathing. We now know that his swallowing muscles were being paralyzed-and that paralysis was gradually spreading through his body. We were so busy we didn't pause to take his symptoms seriously. On the 4th he was lethargic and couldn't keep food down. For us, it was when our perfectly healthy 5-year-old son, Braden, was suddenly paralyzed over the July 4 holiday in 2016. But lives can be derailed in a thousand different ways. We all have a picture in our minds of how our lives as a family will unfold. How a Summer Cold Led to Rare AFM Diagnosis Immediately seek medical care if your child develops sudden arm or leg weakness, a droopy face, or has difficulty swallowing or speaking. However, parents can remind children to follow these simple steps to help avoid illness: We do not know why some children develop this condition after a common viral respiratory infection and others don't. A recent uptick in children with respiratory illnesses due to rhinoviruses and enteroviruses, including EV-D68, was reported by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention ( CDC). Since that 2014 outbreak, enteroviruses have been the most commonly identified viruses in lab samples from patients who had AFM. In 2014, there was a rise in AFM cases during anĮV-D68 outbreak. They are common in late summer and early fall, coinciding with these AFM spikes. These viruses typically cause respiratory symptoms, including asthma-like illnesses. New spikes in AFM cases have been caused by non-polio enteroviruses such asĮnterovirus D68 (EV-D68). Several viruses (for example, West Nile virus) are known to cause AFM. The chances of a child getting it are less than one in a million. While the condition sounds frightening, keep in mind that AFM is very rare. (See " How a Summer Cold Led to a Rare AFM Diagnosis," below.) Most of the AFM cases in these outbreaks were in children around 5 years old. Three spikes in cases of AFM occurred in the United States-in late summer to early fall of 2014, 2016, and 2018-with over 660 confirmed cases. Acute flaccid myelitis (AFM) is a rare but serious illness that can cause sudden weakness of muscles, loss of reflexes, and paralysis.
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