Support for Daniel Phillips’ Recovery

As many of you know, our lovely Daniel contracted a severe case of pneumonia and was hospitalized on July 1st. He spent 45 days in the Intensive Care Unit at Loma Linda University Medical Center where he remained on a ventilator and sedated for 19 days. While his body fought hard to overcome the pneumonia, his other organ systems suffered from the body-wide infection (sepsis), leading him to have kidney damage that required dialysis intervention, liver damage that required multiple paracentesis procedures (draining fluid from his abdomen), and hypoxemic respiratory failure (low oxygen level in the blood), along with many more. He has continued to fight and overcome the accumulating medical diagnoses that have piled up, with two massive feats of overcoming sepsis (which has a 40% mortality rate) and beating the most life-threatening period of the acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS) which in itself has a 40-60% mortality rate!!! Praise God!
     After leaving ICU, he was transferred to a hospital floor to monitor his cardiac and lung functions and then at 60 days was transported to an acute care rehabilitation facility for ongoing respiratory therapy and physical therapy. Throughout this long hospital journey, he has not been able to eat or drink as his muscles in his throat that help with swallowing and preventing the food from entering the lungs have been severely weakened from the prolonged intubation. While he was able to protect his airway enough to avoid a tracheostomy, his throat and lungs have proven to take the long scenic road to recovery. This means he has a feeding tube through his nose that is providing him constant nutrition and hydration, which is very uncomfortable. Speech therapy has been working on both his speech and his swallowing abilities and have made huge steps forward! Along with not being able to eat, he has lost the majority of his muscle mass from being confined to bed and in unstable conditions he couldn’t move for such a long period of time. He has slowly began regaining his muscle strength with the help of the incredible physical therapy and occupational therapy teams, and is now able to sit on the edge of the bed, do resistance and strength exercises with his arms, legs and abdomen, and push himself (at slightly faster than snail speed) in a wheelchair! He still has a long road ahead as he retrains his muscles on how to stand and walk, but he has showed dedication and an immense improvement in strength so far!
     At this point, his lung function has drastically improved as he went from requiring mechanical ventilation to now only requiring 3 liters of oxygen, which is incredible!!! His organs have regained the majority of their normal functioning capacity, the infection has cleared from his body (except for some lasting pneumonia and scarring that will take awhile for his lungs to heal from), and he is on the road to recovery! This means, next step for him is transfer to a less medically-acute hospital to a rehabilitation facility where he will continue with his physical, occupational and speech therapies! After being in the hospital since July 1st, he is so ready to be home, however we estimate he will need to be in the rehab center for approximately 2 more months before making his big debut back home. To which then he will need continuing outpatient rehabilitation.

      With all that being said, we are in need of some help with finances as the medical bills continue to pile up. We know you all have been asking how you can help and this is the most tangible place we need it most to support his continuing recovery and celebrate this death-conquering battle he has been on for so long! Anything you can give will be greatly appreciated! 
     Thank you all for your ongoing support through prayers, phone calls, visits to Daniel and us... your support and God’s strength has truly pulled him through this incredibly challenging time and continues to rally his spirits towards recovery and the long term goal of continuing to do life and fun things with all of you! So, thank you, we appreciate you!