May of 2014 Logan Roach was born at UFHealth Shands at 35 weeks gestational age, three days after a nonreasuring nonstress test and having close inpatient monitoring. This was the scariest day of his mommy’s life. At 2 am on May 21st doctors were unable to detect Logan heartbeat so Candi, Logan’s mom, was rushed back to the operating room for an emergency c-section. “My beautiful baby boy was having trouble breathing so I was only able to catch a glimpse of him before they rushed him to the NICU.” Panic doesn’t even begin to describe what the Roach family was feeling at this time. Logan had “taken a hit” at delivery and went some time without oxygen. Logan qualified for cooling therapy which was initiated upon arrival into the NICU by Dr. Weiss. After getting him hooked up to monitors, IV lines placed, and his body cooled to 33.5 C, Dr. Weiss updated the family, explained that Logan would stay cooled for 72 hours and educated them on how this therapy could help save his life. He explained the term “HIE” (hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy) and that it is a condition in which the brain does not receive enough oxygen, this is what Logan was diagnosed with. Logan received one-to-one nursing care in the NICU for the next 72 hours while his body was given the opportunity to heal. On day two of cooling the Roach family was not given good news, Logan was not healing like they had planned, he was not getting better, in fact he was getting worse. The family was told he may not make it through the night and that they should go and visit and sit with Logan. Candi and her family did not leave his side, they sang to Logan, read him stories and prayed for him. The next day he began to improve, his oxygenation was better, and he was back on the road to recovery. Candi stated that no one knew why he got so sick or how and why he just started getting better, he just did. Logan’s doctors and nurses fell in love with him as did everyone who met him.
“God listened and the prayers were working.”
After re-warming there were still bumps in the road that Logan had to battle like being on and off the ventilator, feeding tubes in and out, and learning to feed from a bottle. July 4th wasn’t just a day that America celebrated it’s independence…Logan and his family celebrated theirs too by going home! They broke free of the NICU and Logan has maintained a clean bill of health since. He is growing right on track, developmentally meeting all expected milestones and bringing so much joy to his family. “The people who were part of his recovery and our support during this will never truly know how much gratitude and love I have for them. The Neuro Team and UFHealth Shands saved my sons life. As a parent this has been a journey that will always be close to the surface and has taught me to have faith and never take a single breath for granted.”
Every day with Logan is a blessing and his laughter fills my heart with so much happiness.