Ben Thuss and family

Meet Ben Thuss, a twelve-year-old from Strathroy, Ontario who enjoys playing hockey and baseball as well as doing anything that involves the great outdoors. He has a competitive spirit and his parents would describe him as having an “old soul” that he displays well when going to Tuesday morning breakfast at Roy’s with Grandma and Grandpa and the “gang”.

While he was at a hockey development skate on June 7, Ben experienced a brain bleed resulting from a previously-unknown arteriovenous malformation (AVM). He was taken to Children's Hospital at London Health Sciences Centre, where the medical team in the Paediatric Critical Care Unit (PCCU) was able to stabilize him.

On June 14, the team performed an endovascular embolization to stop the bleeding and hopefully hold him over until he could have surgery to remove the AVM at a later date. After a few days of initial recovery, Ben was moved out of the PCCU and on June 26, he was discharged from the hospital and allowed to return home.

On July 18, while visiting family, Ben suffered a significant brain bleed and was rushed by ambulance to Children’s Hospital, where he received emergency surgery to relieve the pressure caused by the bleeding as well as “clip” the AVM to ensure that he would never suffer a rupture like this again. So far, Ben has shown a few small signs of recovery including squeezing the hands of loved ones, occasionally blinking to respond to questions and even smiling and laughing quietly at a “poop joke” from his Dad Rob. Unfortunately at the moment, he is unable to verbalize and he is confined to his hospital bed.

Ben has a very long road to recovery and rehabilitation ahead of him, first at Children’s Hospital and then if he meets the criteria for rehab requirements, via inpatient services at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital in Toronto. The employment insurance (EI) family caregiver benefit for children helps reduce the impact of his Mom Kelly remaining with Ben throughout his stay while his Dad spends as much time as he can, travelling back and forth from Strathroy to care for their daughter Lily and work at his renovation and construction business whenever possible.

Unfortunately, there’s only so much we can do to reduce the strain Rob and Kelly are experiencing in this situation. With your help, we want to do what we can to alleviate just one source of stress by further lowering the impact of decreased family income and increased expenses for frequent travel and other needs. With Rob and Kelly’s consent, we have launched this campaign.