Fall 2009 Newsletter

CARES Foundation, Inc.

Adrenal Crisis and EMS: One Family’s Story

As the parent of a child with SWCAH, you know the day will come when you have to give your child his first injection. What you don’t know is where you will be, will you be able to calm down to do it and will you have someone there to help you. Here is how it happened for me.

I was a trainer at a workshop in Denver when my son, Clay, became ill with the stomach flu. And as we know, the stomach flu for a child with SWCAH can be serious—this time it was, as we ended up in the ER in an adrenal crisis. I got the call that he had thrown-up so I immediately left the workshop and headed to the hotel room. We followed the oral stress dose protocol but he continued to vomit—and that is when it hit and it took all of twenty minutes but it felt like a second. He was limp, eyes rolling into the back of his head, pale and cold—and I was scared to death!  

I called 911 as my fear was coming alive in front of me, my son was in dire need and I had to act fast. The paramedics and hotel staff arrived in minutes—so quickly in fact, I had just pulled his injection and solu-cortef from the medical bag I carry with us. Oh help me, give me the strength to slow this down because I knew I had to give him a shot—and this was the first time.

At that point they put an oxygen mask on my angel, he was only three years old at the time, and started asking lots of questions. Of course, they told me they could not give him his injection. Imagine, here we were with trained personnel surrounding us and they couldn’t “legally” give my son a shot that would save his life. Reason being “the attending doctor at the hospital to which we were being transported didn’t prescribe it.” It was up to me!  

Literally, I had to tell them to “stop” as they were trying to load he and I onto the gurney and I still hadn’t given him his shot. I got them to stop, and with a kind paramedic next to me, he coached me through it. The injection was completed and within 10 minutes, my little angel was blinking his big brown eyes, color was back in his skin and I was in tears of relief and gratitude. If it wasn’t for CARES, I wouldn’t have been as prepared and informed when it came to saving my own child’s life. And that is what I did that day, I saved his life.  

Thank you CARES for providing me with the knowledge and skills to save my son. I am forever grateful for the guidance and support you provide our family!