Help Stephen and his family

(11-15-2021)We are now beginning our home care journey. Our follow up is tomorrow I’ll have more information then but I just wanted to thank everyone for their continued support. We hasn’t realized until we actually came home, exactly how different things are going to have to be to keep our son safe and in the best possible health. We’ve been advised he’s at an increased risk for COVID-19, so there’s been discussions on our best options for the rest of the school year and things like that. We are hoping to get more specific information at our appointment tomorrow. Thank you again to everyone that has been here for us and our son. You all have truly been a blessing!

(See updates)

Hello my name is Kelsie. My son Stephen is 3yrs old and currently in the pediatric unit at Akron children’s hospital main campus in Akron Ohio. After about a month of taking Stephen to see multiple doctors and an urgent care and multiple different medications we decided to bring him to the ER at Akron children’s in boardman. We live in austintown. When we arrived he was really lethargic and not acting like himself at all. He tested positive for rhino virus which has turned into pneumonia. He is also asthmatic and has serious environmental allergies. He was transferred to the pediatric intensive care unit in Akron immediately and neither his father nor I were allowed to ride with him due to covid restrictions we had to follow behind the ambulance. Our families have been doing their best to help us out with what they can but I know we are in a pandemic and things were hard before this happened. So After staying in the PICU from Sunday to Monday they Let him be transferred to the regular pediatric unit on Monday night. But that night after he fell asleep and every time he’s slept since then his 02 stats would drop and he has to be on 50% oxygen. So from these last couple days we have tried taking him down to 40% while he is awake and alert he does really good with 40% but as soon as he tries to sleep he drops and has to go back up again. If at any point while he is Awake he has to be at 50% for more then an hour he will be transferred back to the PICU. We have tried 35% while he is awake but he has been unable to tolerate it every time. Right now the only things we have are goals for a discharge. The amount of time we are going to be here has changed multiple times to now just being indefinite. His father and I have worked for Instacart since March of 2020 delivering groceries the entire pandemic but we obviously are unable to go do orders and also be here with our son. Our utilities, phone and other bills are coming due for November and we have a bald tire on our car that really needs replaced. Even a used one would make me feel more comfortable sending his dad driving around Akron and of course back and forth to our house in austintown to get supplies as needed. We also need gas to do that. Everything here cost money which I was not really expecting Even the cafeteria is more expensive then I thought it would be and we can only get one guest meal per day. Some personal items are desperately needed at this point for our personal hygiene and things of that nature. So that is why I am asking for help. We do have insurance so I am not asking for help with medical bills or anything like that. There may be some things we need to buy afterwards for at home care but I am unsure of that yet we just really need help with the day to day of living up here out of a hospital room. We would be very grateful for any little but anyone could help us with. If you would like to send us items or something like that message me or someone who knows me on Facebook I’m sure there would be a way we could get it. Denise Huffman is his grandmother(dads mom) she is helping us manage this page. Thank you so much in advance to anyone that does help us or anyone that has or is we are extremely grateful for all the support and prayers in this very difficult time. Thank you again.

The Huffman/Scahill family.

(Updates have been added on how he is doing and the things we have learned we will need moving forward)

We are also finding out that there are quite a few people who do not care for GoFundMe, (this is our first time ever using GoFundMe) so if that is the case but you still want to help feel free to message us or someone we know. We also have cashapp and PayPal. Th eyes also a couple ways to have items delivered to the hospital. 

Thank you all again!