My nephew Aaron Tanner is fighting for his sight! 

This fund has been established to help cover the increasing out-of-pocket expenses as a result of Aaron's horrible eye injury/infection and subsequent cornea transplant.  ANY donation amount is greatly appreciated!  Many of the multiple medications and diagnostic procedures have not been covered by his health insurance, not to mention Aaron has been unable to work consistently since this ordeal began June 27th.  He has a long road to recovery and his wife Crystal is a stay-at-home mom.  It is unclear how much, if any, of the approximately $25,000  surgery will be covered by insurance.  In addition, Aaron and Crystal have 2 small children and while they live in Evansville, IN his case is so rare he has required specialized treatment in Indianapolis requiring nearly 15, 6-hour roundtrips since July 1st, which is very costly as well as mentally and physically exhausting for them and the children. 


Here is the history of Aaron's injury as posted by his wife on the facebook page "Prayers and Updates for Aaron Tanner"

Summary of Aaron’s injury July 16:
Thursday June 27th Aaron woke up like any other day. He mowed the yard and worked outside the house. The kiddos were asking to swim, so Aaron being the fun-loving dad he is decided to jump into the pool with all his clothes on! The kids joined right in the fun. They swam in the pool for a short time before getting out to get ready for baseball practice. Aaron helped coach Peytons All-Star team that night. As Practice went on his eye became more and more irritated. It was itchy, red and swollen.
Friday morning(June 28th) he woke up and his eye was extremely swollen and irritated. He was in a lot of pain as well so he went into see the doctor as soon as they opened. The doctor gave him a steroid and some eye drops to put in and put a patch on his eye and told him to rest it and come back Monday morning. Saturday Aaron woke up and he could not see out of his left eye, he was totally blind. It was swollen, red, and a white film was covering it. During this weekend he had to miss one of Peytons baseball tournaments as well as his 8th birthday party.
Monday morning July 1st, we went back to the doctor and almost immediately upon examination the doctor sent him to a cornea specialist in Evansville. That doctor was out of the country so they told us to get in the car and drive to Indianapolis right away. We went to Price Vision Group in Indy and quickly began his treatment. The first week we were there Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday. They took pictures and sent samples to the lab to identify the infection. The next week we were there Monday, Wednesday and Friday. We have basically been going every other day to every two days. They have scraped his eye to send a sample off for culture, it was an extremely painful process. They have identified one bacteria growing but are still trying to identify others that are growing in his culture specimen. He has had his medication changed pretty much every time we go in for an appointment. At any given time he is on a couple oral forms of antibiotics as well as 4-8 prescription eye drops every hour around the clock.

The doctors have expressed serious concern that they are worried he may lose his eye. They have told us that they are doing everything they can to fight the infection, save his eye and give him his vision back.
As of right now, we are living life one day at a time. We are hopeful they will find out the right course of treatment for him. We are praying for a total healing and for him to regain his sight.

Update July 17:
Thank you all for your thoughts and prayers. We went in for a checkup to see if the infection had cleared up any. The doctor basically said the infection wasn’t responding to the medicine. His cornea was dangerously thin and he was worried the infection would perforate his eye. The doctor made the call to perform an emergency cornea transplant on him. They took him to surgery right away. He did great in surgery. The doctor said it went as well as could be expected. They were not able to get all the infection so that is still an obstacle he will need to overcome. The doctor said by no means is he out of the woods but at the time it was the best option. We are home now and he is resting. We go back in the morning to check on the transplant. We cannot thank you all enough for your thoughts and prayers. ❤️ Please keep them coming. We will update after tomorrow’s appointment.

Update July 18:
Last night was a bit rough. We didn’t get to bed til late and had to wake up super early. He had to sleep propped up so he was a bit uncomfortable and neither of us slept well. We went in early this morning for Aaron’s post op day 1 check. The doctor saw us in the buildings main lobby and took us right into an exam room so he could take a look at him. The doc said the pressure in his eye was extremely high and he needed to relieve it..so they stuck a needle in his eye to remove the fluid buildup. Again another very painful procedure. They added more eye drops to his already extensive medication list. He is still on the drops every hour.

Everything else seemed to be on track. Still has some infection in the eye. It is hard right now to give us timeframes for a “usual recovery” because his case is far from the norm. The doctors are still monitoring him very closely and addressing each issue as it comes. The doctor said it is too soon to tell if he will retain his sight but IF he does it will most likely be when all the sutures come out in around 6 months.

He has a long road to recovery. We are still praying for a full and total healing for him. His next appointment is tomorrow afternoon.

We cannot say enough how grateful we are for all the prayers. ❤️

Update July 19:  FINALLY some good news and no painful procedures today. Doctor said everything is healing. They sent his cornea off to pathology and those results aren’t back yet. Still no vision. Still on the fortified eye drops every hour to continue to fight the remainder of infection. He is still unable to take the anti-rejection meds so we are praying that his body accepts the transplant. He is in good spirits today and we are still praying for a full recovery and total healing ❤️

Continue to follow Aaron's  story:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1592407770889123/ 

And thank you so much for giving