Marco Antonio Arellano's Medical Expenses
Donation protected
- Hi I'm Zulema Arellano, Marco Antonio Arellano's mom, and asking for assistance for Marco during is turning out to be the hardest time in our lives. We started this journey in 2022 after contracting Covid-19 within a month Marco started to notice floaters in his right eye and it progressed to blurred vision until eventually by mid summer when we finally got to see a specialist in San Antonio, who ordered an MRI that showed a lesion on his brain indicative of something autoimmune like MS. His vision in his right eye had big black jagged holes in the central vision only on his right eye. That summer Marco didn't get to spend his time swimming at the city pool. Instead we headed to North Central Baptist Hospital in San Antonio to start iv steroids for 5 days to stop the "flare-up" . Needless to say to date Marco has undergone 3 separate rounds of iv steroids, 2 rounds of plasma pherrises, ivig all of these were inpatient and we spent week after week endlessly it felt like in the hospital. That's not including the 4 infusions he got outpatient of a steroid sparing medicine called Rituximab thats used for chemo treatment and the one infusions of Actembra also another chemo medicine intended to stop the problem with his eyes without the steroids. The entire time he was doing all this he was taking steroids which are really bad for your body and start to wear it down as well as suppressing your immune system. So January 2023 began with having to bring Marco to University Hospital into the children's er because he was complaining of excruciating pain in his abdomen it looked like he might have appendicitis but once they pened him they realized he didn't have appendicitis and in fact he had a small intestine perforation that was caused by the medicine he was taking. After the first surgery a second surgery had to happen for the second perforation then the second perforation, opened up again to the size of a nickel, then he went into septic shock. Once the doctors began exploring his abdomen they realized they had a bigger problem at some point he had become infected with mold a common aspergillious that's on almost everything but because of his suppressed immune system it took root and spread like wild fire in his open muscle and skin. They tried all something new by using a wound vac to put the antibiotic/antifungal medicine directly I to his abdomen and it worked. He still has the mold since it takes a year to be fully treated at least. But he got past the worst part of it which they didn't think he would get passed. He was sedated the entire month of February and was able to finally open his eyes on his birthday March 8th. During the time he was asleep he was being taken to the operating room 2 to 3 times a week to be washed out with the medicine and make sure there was no regrowth of the mold. So for about 5 weeks that went on. Now he's more awake than sedated he still has the breathing tube in but it hopefully can come out soon. He's still extremely sick he's referred to as critically stable but he's reached a point there isn't much more they can do surgically and he has an absys that is in his abdomen that is huge but thank GOD some drains were already placed near the area and after some effort the absys began to drain and come out on the drains. But Marco is going to be doing a long and grueling recovery if we're lucky and I pray we are that lucky. But I'm asking for help in this very troubling time in our lives to help with the medical expenses and bills. Prayers and assistance are greatly appreciated. Thank you so much to anyone that took the time to read this. We have a long way to go still.
Organizer
Zulema Arellano
Organizer
Uvalde, TX