This brain injury story is not for the faint of heart, but it’s one that highlights a major splinter in a system we all assume is set up to protect our kids when we need it most.
Sami’s childhood friend had just returned home after his freshman year away at college. The two took off cruising down a winding road along a coastal town in Southern California. Sami, riding in the passenger seat, was only a few weeks away from graduating high school when disaster struck.
“A police officer called and said Sami had been admitted to UCLA Intensive Care Unit from an overturned car accident,” Sami’s mother, Barbara Ransom, told us. “We learned the wreck was so bad that Sami had to be mechanically extracted.”
“At the hospital [Sami] was in stable condition but placed in an induced coma,” Barbara continued. “She suffered multiple injuries including a fractured pelvis, a fractured elbow, brain swelling, neck fracture, a lacerated liver and seemingly endless stuff to deal with.”
Sami, the oldest of seven siblings, loves to dance, is a natural artist, and has a keen eye for fashion. She'd planned to start college that fall to study psychology; however, two years removed from this horrific accident, Sami’s college dreams are still on hold.
Due to the impact of the crash, “Sami had a severe traumatic brain injury and ended up with hydrocephalus which required a surgically implanted shunt,” Barbara explained.
Sami’s step-father Joel works with Sami while she’s secured in the new tilt table.
However, when doctors inserted the shunt to remove the excess brain fluid, it caused a subdural hematoma in Sami’s delicate brain and caused an onslaught of seizure activity.
In spite of the setback, Sami began to show improvement by early 2019—moving on her own, trying to make sounds, and even swallowing—until she had surgery to replace a deteriorating cranial bone flap with a prosthetic version. Though the surgery was a success, the moment she woke up, Sami began to have new seizure activity, which doctors discovered was caused by multiple strokes.
Once again Sami was placed into an induced coma and required a ventilator in ICU to let her brain rest while her family and doctors figured out the next move.
More than eight months later, Sami finally returned home on January 25th, 2020, where she now remains minimally conscious under the care of her mother, Barbara, and her stepfather, Joel, with some support from in-home nursing. Originally, Sami’s grandmother, aunt and uncle were all in town from Washington to help, but the spread and associated risks of coronavirus forced them to return back up north for the time being.
“Unfortunately, all therapy has stopped,” Barbara confided in us. “In Los Angeles, only those who are ‘active and responsive’ are given therapy.”
Since Sami is still minimally conscious and can't consistently voluntarily move her body, LA County has unceremoniously stopped all medically necessary therapy, leaving her family to fend for themselves without professional therapeutic guidance. This is a reality all too familiar for families like Barbara’s dealing with pediatric brain injury, but yet it’s something that seems to go unchanged year after year.
Unwilling to let her daughter simply fade away without therapy, Barbara has fought tooth and nail to bring occupational and physical therapy into her home. As Barbara researched her options, Sami’s physiatrist strongly recommended the use of a therapeutic tilt table, which would allow her to be positioned upright to help with alertness, bone growth and density, organ function and help with digestion, just to name a few.
Insurance and other government programs have repeatedly denied Sami this important and costly piece of durable medical equipment, so Holton’s Heroes stepped in to purchase one for Sami so she can continue to improve. Now, Sami’s parents and nurses have the freedom to place her in it multiple times a day to help improve the quality of her life.
“Tilt tables are expensive and we are so fortunate to be able to have one for her.”
On Father’s Day in 2017, 2-year-old Josiah was running around his home, excitedly zooming from room-to-room , as he typically did. However, in a matter of seconds he managed to elope out of the back door undetected and make his way to the family pool. Read Josiah’s amazing tale of recovery now.