- Joined
- Oct 3, 2011
- Messages
- 1
It all started in September of 2010. My sister Amy woke up in the middle of the night complaining of severe abdominal pain and my mother rushed her to our local ER at Howard Memorial Hospital. At first they thought it was Appendicitis but tests revealed that it was not appendicitis but there was blood in her stool so our family doctor asked her to come see him for more tests because he was concerned. It was then that we discovered that she was badly anemic. He tried sending her to various gastroenterologists but none of them would take her. In december, she ended up being so anemic that she had to be admitted to the hospital and given two pints of blood. Finally in January of this year, she had her first appointment with Dr. Fusch, one of the Pediatric Gastroenterologists at Arkansas Children's Hospital. By this time, she was down to a frightening 68 pounds and looked so frail and skinny and was having frequent bloody diarrhea. When Dr. Fusch saw her, he immediately admitted her to Arkansas Children's Hospital and begun running tests. She was so sick that she had to have a PIC line inserted into he right arm and had to be fed intravenously. They finally did an Colonoscopy and an endoscopy and a biopsy of her colon. They told my mother and I, who had stayed in the hospital with her, that her upper GI tract was fine but her lower gi tract looked horrible. Then the biopsy results showed that she had Ulcerative Colitis and they immediately started her on treatment. Today, she is doing very well. She now weighs a healthy 85lbs and has been taken off of prednisone and zantac and her maintenance medication has been cut down to half the original dose, she also takes immune suppressants and will require a flu shot and she sees Dr. Fusch every two months at Arkansas Children's Hospital 
