LaNeigha Jean

Welcome to LaNeigha's web page. This page was created to share my daughters life.

LaNeigha Jean Heyrend was born on June 21 2003 at 12:02AM at the Universtity of Utah hospital. She was born with O.E.I.S Complex(Omphalocele-Exstorphy-Imperforate anus-Spinal defects). The Omphalocele was replaced at 24 hours old but most of her intestines were destroyed, she was left with maybe around 50cm of small bowel. She wasnt born with much of her colon. So she has had an ostomy her whole life. Her bladder was also outside of her body and that was fixed, but she will always have to cath her self to urinate. She was placed on TPN after her 9 hour surgery at 24hours old. LaNeigha spent a little over 3 months at Primary Childerns Medical Center in Salt Lake City, Utah. I was able to take my baby home for the first time on September 29th 2003. I really enjoyed having my LaNeigha home. One week after being home she got a urnary track infection, but that was simple enough that she only spent three days in our home town hospital and then returned home again. But on October 30 2003 LaNeigha spiked a fever and I rushed her into Our home town hospital but they just took a urine sample and gave her a dose of Gentimicin and told me that her fever should be gone in a couple of hours and that I should call her doctor in the morning. Well her fever never went away all night she was so sick and I didnt know what to do for her, so first thing in the morning on Oct 31 I called her doctor and told him what was going on and her got us in right away. The moment her doctor looked at her he told me that she was to sick and asked me why the hospital didnt admit her last night...well I,myself was very concerned because when I took her in the hospital they didnt even take a blood culture. The doctor admitted us right away. We got blood cultures drawn and put her on Gentimicin. Well the whole day of October 31 LaNeigha just started to get worse and worse cultures were coming out negitive, poor thing she looked so helpless. Well the next morning on November 1st LaNeigha wasnt getting any better and we still didnt know what was going, I told her Doctor to get on the phone with Primary Childrens Medical Center and tell them to come and get my daughter.By 2:30pm that afternoon Primary Childrens Life fleight team came and picked up LaNeigha and took her to PCMC. Around 11:00pm that night the Idaho Falls hospital called and informed the ICU at PCMC that LaNeigha had yeast growing from her line. By this time LaNeigha was already on the vent and going down hill very quick. The Next couple of days didnt look to promising LaNeigha had stopped urinating and was getting very puffy and on Monday November 3rd 2003 the Doctors told me that they thought that she was in kidney failure. Her pick line was pulled out. I cried and prayed that God would let her recover. Well on Wednsday November 5th I spotted little drops of urine in her cathiter tube, God was there and we again saw a miracle.Around November 10th LaNeigha got another pic line placed.She started to get better and by November 26th we were on our way home again for Thanks Giving. LaNeigha was in the hospital a couple of times for urinary track infections but aver all she was doing good. Our vist to Primary Childerns Medical center to she LaNeigha's GI Dr. Jackson was a very hard emoitional one. He told me that LaNeigha would need a transplant in order to live, he asked me if I would consider going and getting LaNeigha evaluated. Yes I said, what ever I have to do to save my daughters life. He said ok I will get the ball rolling and that he did. He emailed Childerns Hospital of Pittsburgh and the center in Omha Nebraska. Omha wanst intested on taking LaNeigha bubt Pittsburgh was happy to. But our problem came with her insurance they didnt want to pay for her evaluation. I faught and faught, And I decided that I would do what ever I had to, to get LaNeigha on the transplant list My family and her dads family helped me in doing fundraising along with a bank in our home town. We recieved great donations for LaNeigha's long road a head. Three months went by but still no response from her insurance and we still dint have enough money to get our foot in the door for evaluation. I dint believe that LaNeigha would get her chance of life. On March 24th 2004 I got off work and went home and LaNeigha's private home nurse was concerned because her stool looked kinda bloody. I told her I would watch it and if it continued to look like that then I would call her GI Dr. in Salt Lake City. Well an hour later I changed LaNeigha and sure enough her stool was bloody, so I called Dr. Jackson in Salt Lake City and he asked me if LaNeigha was acking differant or if she seemed ok. I said she seemed ok, he said ok, how long will it take you to get here? I said about 3&1/2 Hours, he told me to get her there and her would have a bed set up for her. I was getting her ready to go, getting all her meds and personal things, and the phone rang it was LaNeigha's health insurance coordinator he said Jessica I have some great news, I said yes..? LaNeigha's insurance will pay for her evaluation and transplant and care before and after transplant. I just about passed out I was so happy but I thought maybe it is to late? We arrived at Primary Childerns in Salt Lake City around 9:00pm that night. I honestly thought that we would get LaNeigha's bleeding under controll and she would be back home with me, I was wrong. But on April 5th 2004 LaNeigha was life flieghted to Pittsburgh to start her eval, I came got there two hours after her with my step mom. The eval went good, LaNeigha still had her bleeding but we kept it undercontrol. On April 9 LaNeigha was life fleight back to Salt Lake to await for her call for transplant. There was some mess with the insurance not wanting to pay for me to fly with her so I had to stay one more night to catch my flight back to Salt Lake. My step mom and I went to bed and about 12:00am I recieved I phone call from The ICU Dr. in Salt Lake, LaNeigha was bleeding uncontrolably and was put on the vent, she wasnt doing very good. My dad was in Salk Lake that night because he was picking us up from the airport the next morning, I called him and asked to be at the hospital and go see LaNeigha after they got her stable. On Saturday morning we arrived in Salt Lake City and went to see LaNeigha she was stable at the moment but she looked so bad. This was Easter sunday weekend, And on Easter Sunday LaNeigha started to look a little better. That night I planned on getting some sleep sense I hadnt the last couple of days my mom was in town along with other family members. Around 5:20am on Monday April 12 I received a phone call from the ICU Dr. and he told me that LaNeigha's heart had stopped and they had to do cumpression to get her back and told me to get there as soon as possible. I was only 10 mins away. The morning was so long, the family was all there both her fathers and mine. laNeigha looked gone she looked so sick. around 1:20pm that afternoon I sat down with The ICU Dr, The on call GI Dr. and a socail worker and had a long talk about what was going on with LaNeigha, LaNeigha's heart beat wasnt stable and other factors was stacked against her. We had decided that LaNeigha shouldnt have to suffer any more she had faught her whole life. We just asked for a couple of hours so that my cousins could be there with me. They started to get LaNeigha ready so we could say our goodbye's. at 3:40PM everyone was there that was going to be I walked in to the ICU and told the Dr. that we were all her, she looked at me and said go sit in the grief room I will get the other Dr. because we think Laneigha is turning around. Well my whole family and friends sat and stud in the grief room as the DR.'s came in an told me that LaNeigha was turning around and that they didnt think that we should take her off life suport yet, that LaNeigha is a fighter and that we owe her that. I was so cunfussed I was happy that Laneigha was turning around but I didnt know what to think. LaNeigha pulled through, on April 16 th LaNeigha was off the vent. Dr.Jackson and my self along with other nurses and Dr.'s decided that LaNeigha had a few more options if she was in Pittsburgh because it was only a matter of time that she would bleed like that again. It took a coulpe of months to get here in Pittsburgh. But we arrived her on July 15th 2004, two weeks later Laneigha was back on the vent for bleeding, she stayed on the vent for one day short of 7 weeks. We have had infections to fight against and many fluid balances but Laneigha is a fighter and I will fight right along side her because she isnt ready to give up. She is now back on the vent, and has been on the transplant list for almost 7 months. God has brought her this far, we will continue to fight.

Journal

Wednesday, March 4, 2009 8:42 PM CST

LaNeigha who has been in heaven for 4 years now has to very cute brothers Terrence Jonathan And the newest addition Rylan Francis Life has been hard the last 4 years I am still going to grips that I will never see LaNeigha in flesh again but I see her in the smiles that my boys give m e they light up the room when they smile just as LaNeigha did.

Hospital Information:

Childerns Hospital of Pittsburgh
3705 5th Av
Pittsburgh Pa 15213

Links:

E-mail Author: neighabug@aol.com

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