Cole Hansberger

Cole is a amazing one year old boy. The day before his first birthday on August 5, 2017 he began to show signs of botulism. While we did not know at that time as we felt he may have hurt his neck from falling. The very next day we took him into urgent care and we were told to monitor and take him in that Monday should he not improve. By 6pm on his birthday I took him into the children's ER to be told we needed an immediate transport to Banner Thunderbird. Within 12 hours of arriving Cole began to have respiratory failure. He went from my rambunctious amazing baby to completely paralyzed. When they took him back for his MRI to rule out any brain or spine issues I got the call that they would have to intubate him. Never have I felt so helpless as a mother, there was nothing I could do that given moment other than collapse and pray that my baby would be okay. Tuesday afternoon after all his test came back normal or negative the ICU doctor called the doctors in California that handle botulism; they could almost guarantee Cole had botulism and approved the order of the antitoxin babyBIG; this is difficult to obtain as the medical staff has to be sure of botulism and the hospital has to pay $45,300 to just have it shipped. On Wednesday August 9 in the morning at 130AM he received babyBIG; in 8 hours we saw some slight movement of his limbs. The following week we received the confirmation infantile botulism type A; while our hearts sank knowing he would have a long recovery we also rejoiced knowing he would have a full recovery with no long term issues. Shortly after on Tuesday August 15 at 325PM we had the scare of a life time; Cole desaturated to 0 and his heart rate went to 20. To see your child receive chest compressions is something you never come back from. They still have no explanation of what happened only to say he may have vageled. As of today he is still intubated and progressing more and more each day. He is fighting off a nasty bacterial infection in his trachea and lungs at the moment but the doctors say that won't impact him being extubated.