Drew Danisch

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On September 20th, Drew was waiting for his bus, chatting with me, and Gary was in the kitchen making lunch.  I stepped away for only a moment to hear Gary yell out his name, when we heard a big crashing sound.  Drew leaned onto the door that leads into the garage from thehouse, fell out the door, hit his head on my car and fell to the floor.  He was unable to bear weight on his legs when we went to pick him up.  Apparently he blacked out, or that is what we think happened.  He was conscious when we found him and able to tell me who he was, who I was and where we were.  We took him immediately to the ER where they discovered through a series of tests that he has a rare disease called Moya Moya.  This is a disease of the carotid arteries and arteries in his brain not getting enough blood flow.  What eventually happens is the arteries narrow and when there is no blood flow he will stroke or brain hemorrhage.  After finding out the diagnosis we met with a surgeon at the University of Minnesota to find out more about he disease and what we needed to do for Drew.  The Moya Moya is on the right side of his brain only, which is good, however, in the long run he could also have it on his left side so that is scary.  For now we are focusing on him having surgery on the right side of his brain.  Surgery is December 27th, 2017 today.  His surgery is in progress as we speak.  It is a inter cranial bypass on his right side.  They will try a direct procedure finding an optimal artery to sew onto the narrowing artery, however this is not a guarantee.   We hope for this direct procedure to work, if not they will do an indirect procedure.  We will let you know.  For now please say a prayer for Drew.  Thank you!!