I write this post about our son Sam. Consider it a kind of tribute to him. The reason is because we are so proud of him of the fact what he achieved already is in little life so far especially because of what he had already been trough.
The second message I want to give with this post is that, in case of the slightest doubt, you always should ask or go for a second opinion when it’s involves your or someone others health. Even when you think there are no other options left…
It is over 6 years ago when Sam fell out of the trampoline in our garden. There was a fence around it, but you know kids, he didn’t close it so he fell out on the concrete floor. I immediately saw this was bad (his arm was in a strange position) so I picked him up and we drove as fast as we could to the hospital (the hospital is about 500 meters from our house). When we arrived at the hospital they took a x-ray and said to us that his elbow was broken but that it was a clean fracture and plaster would do it. We had to came back in a week.
When we were at home Sam kept complaining about the pain and that it didn’t felt right. Of course it got through our mind that he is still a kid (6 at that time) and that he is exaggerating about it, but he kept saying it so we went back to the hospital before the week was over. My wife went with him and got into a discussion with the doctor. To make a long story short, he was irritated by the questions my wife asked and the explanation she asked about certain things on the x-ray. It came down to it that he said my wife (literally) ‘I’m the doctor, so I am the expert’. Again he told us to come back next week, but my wife existed on taking another x-ray (I’m still thankfull for that) so the doctor gave the order but was greatly annoyed.
When she came out the x-ray with Sam the radiologist told her that there was a piece of bone missing on the x-ray and that they didn’t knew where it went and that the x-ray was not taken in the right position. When she came back at the doctor he said, again, that the fracture has to heal on its own but maybe there was a little damage at his growth-disc (the disc kids have during their grow). My wife tried a lot of things at the hospital but got nothing more than the story they already told us….Come back after one week…
In the meantime Sam was in a lot of pain and couldn’t do anything so my wife phoned with the insurance company asking for an alternative in doctor. We came up with a specialized doctor in Utrecht at the Utrechts Medisch Centrum (UMC). He was (still is) specialized in complex fractures with arms and legs especially with kids. We made an appointment an asked the hospital in Zutphen to send over all the information and x-rays to Utrecht. When we came in Utrecht Dr. Sakkers (the new doctor) told us that the fracture Sam had was a complex one and had to be operated immediately after the accident, which our hospital didn’t do. At this stage his bone was to damaged to grow (in the right way) together. The message we got was that it was a big possibility that his arm would never function as before again…. I can tell you, as a parent….it sticks like a knife right in your heart, you see instantly his future being limited by this accident. I got angry to, emotional angry about our hospital… If they just….. a big if…
Dr. Sakkers told us that they still have to operate him to limit further damage, so Sam got surgery within a week…. We were warned that it was a complex surgery and that they we’re sticking screws into his bones to try to connect them again but couldn’t predict the outcome yet. Our hearts were broken to see the little fellow lying in the hospital bed, stuffed with morphine against the pain he was suffering…. Some later reality strikes in that this could have been prevented if the other doctor had paid the attention needed and had listened to others and had put his pride aside….
After the surgery the screws where in the right place but the bone didn’t got connected. So the only thing holding the elbow in place where the screws. He got prosthesis to protect his arm against external factors. At school he suffered a lot of problems because it was his writing hand, so he couldn’t improve his writing skills which are so important at that age. He also couldn’t participate in games and gymnastics at school. And besides all that he was also often absent at school cause he had to go to the hospital often…
After a while Dr. Sakkers told us he had to undergo another surgery because his bone still wasn’t connecting and growing towards each other. This time they tried to put the screws in with a different angle. So they did, one of the old screws broke but it was better to let it in because drilling it out would cause more damage. The second attempt failed again, again much frustration and pain for us but mostly for Sam and not to mention the loss of lessons at school….
Dr. Sakkers told us that he didn’t had any options left but he didn’t gave up. He told us that he would leave for a congress in Austria and that he will meet a doctor over there who is specialized in this kind of trauma and that she is the best in the field… He promised us to take all the files of Sam with him and would talk to her about it….So he did….After a while we got a phone call that Dr Sakkers had spoken to Dr. Weinberg (Austria) and that she saw some options to operate Sam and improve his current situation. They planned a surgery in Utrecht and Dr. Weinberg came to Holland to do the surgery, that is something we never experienced before.. Also the way of informing us parents was something totally different to us than we experienced before… Sam had to recover after the surgery for quite some time, with all the surgery and revalidation we were 2,5 years further. All that time he had to walk with a protheses around his arm to protect his elbow. In Utrecht they made him a great one with Ajax adornment :) (a dutch soccer club). He could lock this prosthesis in two positions so he had a little freedom of movement.
Sam drumming even with his protheses
The result of the last operation was that there was a great improvement on the growth of his bones to each other and that things were looking better than before. Though his arm was malformed comparing to his other arm. We were so happy with the result, finally things were in favor of Sam and there was a little light at the end of the tunnel….
Sam had to go to revalidation therapy for a long time at a special clinic in Apeldoorn, they helped him physically but also mentally cause he was struggling with his problems a lot. He was getting moody at home, uninterested at school, not the Sam we knew..
Finally after a year he had to go through surgery one more time according to Dr. Weinberg. This time she wanted to operate him in Germany (the hospital she was working) because she has got all the equipment she needed in her own hospital. With the surgery she wanted to restructure the bone in his arm so the deviation of the shape of his arm wouldn’t cause any problems in the near future. So we travelled to the hospital in Germany, It was quite a big operation. He stayed there for three day’s but again things looked a little better for Sam.
Back in Holland he had to go to therapy again but because of the positive outcome of the last surgery Sam was very positive himself. He did his best to get the normal function back again in his arm, and as good and as bad as it goes now, he is doing very well considering the circumstances.
Finally he also got the ‘green light’ from the doctor that he can fully use his arm without limitations.. So we had to trow a party for this one :)
As far as the hospital in our hometown concerned, they admitted the misjudgment… That’s good, but we rather had that Sam didn’t have to go through this all..
Final to this post, I am damn proud of Sam, he managed to catch up at school so good that he managed to go to middle school next year in a bi-lingual education, who would have thought that :). And to those who ever come in a situation like his, don’t doubt your own feeling and don’t hestitate for asking a second opinion, it could avoid so much trouble…
Thank you for reading…
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