Landen Arndt's Recovery!

Landen has had a very long journey into this world! Not too much of it has been in his Mothers, Fathers, or Sisters arms where most newborn's lay for the first couple months.
Due to Landen having Laryngomalacia and a component of Tracheomalacia, he has spent many days in the NICU on and off.

He has flown in a Helicopter more time than the average adult will ever,

He has felt more needles, stress, and discomfort in the last 2 months than anyone would ever wish.

Yet during all of this, His parents Kelly and Jeremy have been nothing but positive and supportive of the medical staff and his recovery! He is one lucky little boy to be able to have the network of support that he does!!

At this time if you could put yourselves in their shoes financially............. You would understand all of the other stresses (besides bringing Landen HOME as a healthy child) that they have had and continue to have. Hotels, Food, Travel, Lose of time at work, medical bills, ......... The list could go on.

Please do what you can to Support Landen!!

Offline donations can be mailed directly to:

Kelly or Jeremy Arndt
5388 us hwy 75
Dumont MN 56236

It all will be appreciated GREATLY

History and update below.

Landen Maynard Arndt was born June 20, 2016 at 5:57pm. He was struggling with his breathing right after birth. It continued to worsen through the night and the following morning Landen was air lifted to children's Hospital in Sioux Falls in respiratory distress. Over the next couple of days Landen would have an MRI, cat scan, swallow test and his airway and nasal passages scoped. The doctors found Landen had lacrimal cysts in his nasal passages, reflux and he was diagnosed with laryngomalacia. He required oxygen, feeding tube and IV. Landen had surgery at 10 days old to remove the cysts and have his lacrimal ducts probed. The surgery made it possible for him to eat from a bottle and breath on his own. His laryngomalacia was not thought at that time to be a big concern. On July 4th, after 14 days in the NICU Landen was discharged and able to come home with his family. After 2 days of being home Landen started showing signs of struggling to breath and was not eating well. He was admitted to the Ortonville hospital on July 6th. The following evening he was air lifted again to children's Hospital in Sioux Falls due to his breathing. After some observation it was decided that Landen had a more moderate case of laryngomalacia and would require more additional care at home. We were sent home on the 9th with a better understanding on the condition and what to do at home. Landen spent 10 days at home in which time his condition continued to worsen. On July 26th we went back to Sioux Falls to meet with the ENT and he was very concerned for Landen has he was working very hard to breath. Laryngomalacia is when the larynx is soft and when breathing the soft larynx and epiglottis collapse in the airway, partially blocking it. This causes difficulty breathing, noisy breathing, reflux, and problems eating. 95% of children with this condition will improve on their own and not have any problems. 5% will need life saving surgery. Landen fell in that 5% has it was getting worse instead of better. On July 28th Landen had surgery to remove the extra tissue in his airway. The surgery has improved his eating but did not completely help his breathing. He still has periods of struggling to breath which as led the doctors to believe he also has a component of Tracheomalacia which is a condition characterized by flaccidity of the tracheal support cartilage which leads to tracheal collapse especially when increased airflow is demanded. The trachea normally dilates slightly during inspiration and narrows slightly during expiration.
Landen was discharged July 30th and came home again to his family. The first couple days at home went great but again Landen's condition started to worsen. He went from eating 3 to 4 ounces every 3 to 4 hours to barely getting 2 ounces down at a time and going several hours in between feedings. On August 9th after Landen had refused rhe bottle and gone with out eating for 7 hours we took him to Ortonville. We were told to try Pedia lite and see how the night went. Landen still refused eating so the next morning his doctor in Sioux Falls was contacted and we were told to bring him in right away. He was admitted to the Children's hospital in Sioux Falls on August 10th. On August 11th, they did a swallow test on Landen and found that he was aspirating. Meaning that he was unable to control the liquids once he swallowed and it would start going in his airways. This caused him to panic and feel like he was drowning so eating became a very negative experience for him. They started thickened feeds which he is better able to control but after a couple days he was still not eating like he should. His goal is 2.5 ounces every 3 hours and he was only doing about half of that so on August 15th, they inserted the feeding tube back into Landen. They let him bottle has much as he can and then he receives the rest through his feeding tube. He had an upper GI on August 16th and that came back normal so now they are testing his PH levels in his stomach to see how severe his reflux is.

If that checks out ok we may be looking at having a G tube inserted in his stomach and we will have to feed him that way until his muscles in his airway strengthen up and he can handle it better.