Name: Buddy Wells

Listen to his story:

Diagnosis: Injuries from 4-Wheeler Accident

Christmas Eve night the Wells family all gathered to open gifts. After supper was over some of the kids went for a ride on 4-wheelers. Darrell was heading back to the house, when his wife, Pollie, called and said that there had been an accident, but she did not know if anyone was hurt.  When he arrived back at house, they headed out to find them.  All they knew was that a rescue unit had been called to a 4-wheeler accident.  They discovered that Buddy, their son, had been thrown from the 4-wheeler and was in critical condition.   He was airlifted to Shands Jacksonville where the doctor told the Wells that Buddy had suffered an injury to the left front side of the brain, 4 chipped vertebras in his neck, a broke collar bone, 2 broken ribs, and a punctured lung.

The pressure on his brain was rising and medication was not stopping it. The doctors explained that they were going to induce Buddy into a coma, to try and control the swelling.  One of Buddy's day nurses discovered if she would keep him cool, his pressure would drop.  Unfortunately, that could not help what came next.  Buddy developed pneumonia in his injured lung. They inserted a tube into his chest and he needed to be rotated to keep the fluid from collecting in his chest. The problem was his brain pressure would rise every time he was moved. They had to keep him in a coma to maintain the brain pressure, but the longer he was under, the more problems he would have coming out.

On day 10, Buddy's pressure had started coming down and he was slowly taken off all the IVs.  He was awake, but did not respond to anything. He had lost about 20 lbs and was not cognitive, but he was alive.  It took Buddy’s body nearly 6 days to fully come out of the coma. During this time he responded by moving a ball purchased by CMN for Child Life thus giving his family hope.  

Buddy had spent Christmas and his birthday in Shands Jacksonville while in a coma.  As a critical patient of the PICU, Buddy benefited from the Central Monitoring System purchased by Children’s Miracle Network Funding.  This $50,000 piece of equipment allowed the nurses to provide constant monitoring by having access of his medical stats at the nurses station as well as bedside.  He spent the next 6 weeks at Brooks Rehabilitation.  He is on his way to a full recovery. Children’s Miracle Network funds purchase medical equipment for the pediatric programs at Shands Jacksonville and Wolfson Children’s Hospital.