There are about 10 unintentional drowning deaths in the U.S. alone every day, and one in five of these deaths, is of a child younger than 14 years.
Many a times, non fatal drowning injuries can cause severe brain damage that may result in long-term disabilities such as memory problems, learning disabilities, and permanent loss of basic functioning.
In what appears to be the world’s first, a 2 year old drowning victim who was unresponsive and had suffered cardiac arrest was resuscitated at the Arkansas Children’s Hospital.
The child was found to have suffered significant white and gray matter loss and was described as having ‘deep gray matter injury’; which has changed substantially, thanks to hyperbaric oxygen therapy.
Following the incident, the girl, Eden, who was ‘constantly squirming and shaking her head’, in a bid to reverse the brain damage, was treated with two methods of oxygen therapy by researchers at the LSU Health New Orleans School of Medicine and the University of North Dakota School of Medicine.
This includes normobaric oxygen therapy, where levels of oxygen given are the same as at sea level, and hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT), where they are given pure oxygen at pressures higher than
that of the atmosphere within a special chamber.After 55 days of the accident, doctors started giving Eden normobaric oxygen for 45 minutes twice per day- which appeared to make her more alert and awake, and she stopped squirming.
She started laughing more and was able to move her arms and hands, and grasp with her left. Scientists also noted eye-tracking movements and some speech.
After 78 days, Eden began HBOT therapy, with 45 minute sessions five days per week for four weeks. After 10 sessions, her mother said she was almost back to normal other than motor function.
After 39 sessions—coupled with physical therapy—Eden was able to walk and her speech had returned to normal. Her cognitive abilities had improved and motor function was almost restored to pre-drowning levels.
An MRI scan a month after the 40th HBOT session was conducted which yielded fantastic results with the child showing almost complete reversal of the brain damage initially recorded.
“The startling regrowth of tissue in this case occurred because we were able to intervene early in a growing child, before long-term tissue degeneration,” Paul Harch, who treated Eden, said in a statement. “Although it’s impossible to conclude from this single case if the sequential application of normobaric oxygen then HBOT would be more effective than HBOT alone, in the absence of HBOT therapy, short duration, repetitive normobaric oxygen therapy may be an option until HBOT is available. Such low-risk medical treatment may have a profound effect on recovery of function in similar patients who are neurologically devastated by drowning.”
