Please make giving a resolution in 2012

As we are making our New Year's resolutions, let’s add one more thing to our lists – make life better for children. If you have been out and about this holiday season, you may have seen the new Children’s billboards featuring patient Annabella Spears spreading the message of peace, joy, and giving! 2011 has been a challenging but triumphant year for Annabella. As the Spears family celebrates a new year, they have only a scar across their daughter’s tummy to remind them of the events of the past year.

First-time parents, Alexa and Shad, brought newborn Annabella to their Dallas home in Oct. 2010, but after seven weeks, they noticed that her skin looked yellow. A trip to the pediatrician landed Annabella at Children’s, where she underwent extensive testing and was diagnosed with biliary atresia, a rare disease of the liver and bile ducts.

Without a transplant, Annabella’s liver would fail. She was listed for a new liver in March 2011. “I didn’t want to ask, but I kept wondering if we would lose her, because I had no idea really what ‘transplant’ meant, and it sounded really scary,” Alexa said. “I just kept thinking that we couldn’t lose our little girl.”

All her parents could do was wait for a liver that would be a match for Annabella. She regularly visited the Solid Organ Transplant clinic at Children’s and was closely monitored.

Dr. Dev Desai, division director of pediatric transplantation at Children’s and associate professor of surgery at UT Southwestern Medical Center, would be the surgeon implanting the liver when the time came. “Annabella’s liver failed rapidly, and because of the quickness of her disease, she went to the top of the waiting list,” Dr. Desai said.

At 6:30 a.m. on June 16, Alexa and Shad received the call they had been waiting on for three months. They couldn’t believe the day had finally come. Dr. Desai flew in a jet to procure the organ, returning to Children’s where 8-month-old Annabella
was in the operating room being prepped.

After a successful surgery, Annabella recovered perfectly. “It’s pretty amazing — her skin has gotten pinker, and the whites of her eyes are white again, instead of yellow,” Alexa said. “She has energy plus, and she is rolling over, lying on her belly and having a great time. It’s remarkable.”

You can help make stories like Annabella’s possible by joining Children’s in our daily mission to make life better for children. Please consider making a gift today, and make a difference in the life of a child.