Written by Sarah J Kyle
A MOTHER’S WORST NIGHTMARE
On Feb. 5, 2008, John and Jammie Clemons rushed to the hospital, eager to meet the baby girl who had been preparing for her debut into the world for nine months. After a perfectly normal pregnancy, the Clemonses expected nothing but an equally perfect delivery day.
The Clemonses’ happy day took a dark turn when their new daughter, Christine, swallowed meconium (a newborn’s first fecal matter) in the womb during delivery, sending the infant girl into distress. In a frenzy of panic, the happy day quickly became their worst nightmare.
The medical team at White County Hospital performed an emergency Cesarean section on Jammie and was able to extract Christine within 20 minutes and begin flushing the meconium out of her system. However, they soon realized that Christine had too much meconium in her lungs and would need to be air-lifted to Arkansas Children’s Hospital in Little Rock.
“We laugh now and say ‘what is she going to get for her second birthday?'” Jammie said. “For her first birthday she got a helicopter ride.”
Still in recovery from the Cesarean section, Jammie was unable to accompany her husband and newborn baby to Little Rock, so she waited anxiously for news of Christine’s wellbeing.
While performing a routine echo, or ultrasound, of Christine’s heart, the doctors at Arkansas Children’s Hospital discovered that Christine had a congenital heart disease known as Total Anomalous Pulmonary Vein Stenosis, a condition in which the vein entering her heart had grown into her artery, preventing the oxygenation of her blood.
John and Jammie were informed that Christine would need open-heart surgery, but the surgery was not an emergency case, which would allow Christine’s lungs to heal from the meconium.
The complications caused by the meconium brought light to her heart condition, saving her life.
“That’s the reason I call her my little angel, because technically she saved herself,” Jammie said. “If she wouldn’t have swallowed the meconium, from what we understand, a lot of children that have this congenital heart disease, we probably would’ve taken her home, taken care of her, and in a couple of months we would’ve noticed signs, and she could have very possibly died of what they would’ve chalked up to be SIDS. [Sudden Infant Death Syndrome].”
THE ROAD TO A TRANSPLANT
After surgery, Christine recovered, only to discover months later that she would require another open-heart surgery due to scarring in her heart. The Clemonses geared up for another surgery, and Christine recovered within four days.
In a routine checkup, however, Christine’s surgeon told the Clemonses that Christine needed a lung transplant. Jammie said she and her husband were shocked.
“Until this point, they had said nothing about a lung transplant, nothing at all,” Jammie said.
Christine was the victim of Pulmonary Vein Stenosis, a condition in which the vein pathways are thickened and narrowed, causing a block in he blood vessels.
“They explained to us that 10 percent of the children that had the congenital heart disease that she had develop Pulmonary Vein Stenosis, which is the narrowing of the vessels in the heart and the lungs, and the only thing you can do to get it fixed is to have a transplant,” Jammie said.
Dr. Mitchie sent Christine’s files to Houston Children’s Hospital, but was told by doctors there that Christine would be able to withstand more surgeries rather than be a candidate for a lung transplant. Jammie said her family and the medical team in Little Rock disagreed.
“Dr. Mitchie said, ‘No. I’ve been in that heart twice. I’m not going back. This needs to be fixed, there’s nothing else wrong with this child. This has got to be fixed a different way.’ They were pretty set that they weren’t going to [perform more surgery],” Jammie said.
The team chose to send Christine’s files to St. Louis Children’s Hospital, and Dr. Ronald Grady requested that the Clemons come to St. Louis for an evaluation and explained the details of Christine’s condition.
St. Louis accepted Christine’s case, and now the Clemonses and the doctors must wait for the right time and the right funds—a minimum of $75,000 that the Clemonses are trying to raise to help cover some of the medical expenses.
TEXAS VS. THE WORLD FUNDRAISERS
Harding Student Association President Bryan Clifton said he was eager to help Christine after learning of her story this summer.
“She is just such a gorgeous child, and to just see how much joy she has and the fun in her eyes. […] I think it’s because she doesn’t realize the problems that she’s going through,” Clifton said.
Clifton and the Student Association began planning various fundraisers for the family, including a competition titled “Texas vs. World” in which students sold T-shirts, tossed change in the Lily Pond and did other activities to raise the most money for their team, either “Texas” or “the World.”
“I think [the competition] is a great way to get the pride area from many students from Texas and also from students who cannot stand prideful Texans, and unify the entire student body behind a great cause—to help Christine get the transplant that she needs,” Clifton said. “Harding students have an amazing ability to band together. If we all individually tried to take this cause it would be almost impossible, but together we can use our resources and pull our funds and donate towards Christine’s cause.”
If you would like to donate to Christine’s cause, please contact Bryan Clifton atbclifton@harding.edu. All donations are processed through Christine’s account with the Children’s Organ Transplant Association.
