Support for Madilyn Towers' Medical Costs

None of this was expected. All Dr's stated that everything was fine every week after Dr. appointments and ultrasounds.

So, I am creating this fundraiser to help with medical expenses for my niece who just went through the worst experience a parent can go through.

This is Madilyn Michele Towers' story

This little munchkin made her appearance on October 17 at 3:20 pm weighing 4 lbs 12 oz, 17.5 in long. Her mom, Alyssa, my niece, was induced at 37 weeks because she had a lot of fluid around the baby and she was underweight. Other than that, she was told throughout her pregnancy by her OBGYN and a specialist that everything looked good.

She had her at Moses Taylor Hospital in Scranton, PA. They started her on Pitocin around 10 am and the baby’s heart rate dropped. They stopped the medication and tried again around 2 and said if it drops again, they will do a C-section. Baby didn’t have a reaction, and she had a great delivery. As soon as she was born, they took her to the warming table and we didn't hear her cry. The NICU team started to bag her. They got her stable and whisked her off to the NICU. A while later, they told us that she wasn’t breathing on her own and she was going to be flown to Geisinger Children's Hospital in Danville, PA.

Thursday around 9:30 pm, my sister Michele called stating that both her lungs collapsed and they inserted chest tubes and her oxygen levels were good, and she was stable.

Now thinking everything was smooth sailing, I talked to my sister again around 11:30 pm. She stated that she still wasn’t breathing on her own and that they are transferring her to Delaware to Nemours Children’s Hospital in Wilmington, DE for a higher level of care.

The next update was Friday afternoon around 3:30 pm, stating that the children’s hospital talked to Alyssa while they were on their way down and that they think she had a stroke and still wasn’t breathing on her own and there was nothing more they could do for her and will take her off the machine and let her go in the morning.

Friday night at 9:30 pm, my sister and I headed to Delaware. When we arrived, we spoke with the doctors. He stated that when she was in Danville, they did an ultrasound of her head, and they didn’t see a bleed or anything indicating a stroke. When she got to DE, they did a CT of the head, which was a normal test for new NICU patients, and it showed a bleed and an infarct and said she did have a stroke.

She then developed pulmonary hypertension while she was in Danville as well, which was stressing her heart. They placed her on an ECMO machine, which was the machine they were talking about.

For the ECMO to work efficiently, she needs to be on blood thinners to prevent blood clots from forming in the machine. She couldn’t be on the blood thinners due to the brain bleed, so they would need to remove the ECMO in the morning due to the blood eventually clotting in the machine.

She was getting chest X-rays every 2 hours and had very little improvement in her lungs. Come Saturday morning, they were going to do an echo to see how her heart was doing and then they were going to remove her from the ECMO and see how her vitals were, and then the team would talk to us.

We sat down with the team about an hour later and were told the devastating news that she wasn’t going to survive. As they lowered the settings of the machines, her heart rate went up and her O2 sats dropped to the low 60s. The doctor also said that she had a MASSIVE stroke, that over 50% of the left side of her brain didn’t get oxygen. The doctor said that there wasn’t anything more they could do except to monitor her.

Alyssa had 2 options. 1. They would take her off the machines while Alyssa held her and let her pass away peacefully or 2. They can remove the ECMO tubes surgically and then try and maintain her heart with medication. Alyssa and her boyfriend made the heart-wrenching decision and chose the 2nd option that would be done that afternoon.

The doctor came back a little bit later and said that she talked to another ECMO specialist and said that since the machine is running okay, they can keep her on until the morning if no clots are formed.

We got a call from Alyssa around 12:30 am stating that the machine is forming clots and to come see her.

The doctor reviewed what was going to take place today and stated that there was a good chance that her little heart would not be able to withstand the surgery.

Around 1:15 pm, the RN came and got Alyssa and her boyfriend and said that she made it through surgery and to go see her. Then around 1:45 pm, the nurse said that we can go see her and say our goodbyes as her heart rate was declining.

We spent about 20 minutes with her then let mom and dad alone with her. Around 2:45 pm, the doctor came to the room we were in to tell us Madilyn had passed At 2:35 and if we wanted to say a final goodbye.

For 71 hours and 15 minutes, Madilyn was such a fighter. This munchkin has no idea how much she was loved.

The doctors still do not know what caused her lungs and heart issues or caused the bleed. Mom and dad did consent to an autopsy and genetic testing. I pray that they get answers.

They also consented to tissue donation. I really hope she is eligible to donate something to help another child and spare the family this unimaginable pain and loss.

I cannot express enough how wonderful the staff was. From the security guard to the doctors, RNs, PAs, technicians, social workers, and the family memory creator. There were close to 40 units in the NICU and sadly they were all full.

I believe it takes a special kind of person to work in a children’s hospital’s NICU, especially on the bad days, like today.