Please Help Elliott’s Recovery From A C6 Spinal Cord Injury

Hi, I'm Reeve Flora. I'm Elliott Greet's Auntie. Let me tell you about my amazing nephew.

All Elliott wanted to do with his future is help people. That is why he became the youngest Emergency Trauma Technician to ever get certified in the state of Alaska at the age of 16. That tells you a lot about him. That is what his passion is. Now, Elliott needs our help. On March 30th, after his Service High School track meet, Elliott sustained injuries from slipping on ice which caused him to fall from a tall building that left him with a fractured skull and a broken neck. Because Elliott knew how to respond in an emergency, he was able to tell his friend how to support him while waiting for the ambulance. He was admitted to the Providence Pediatric ICU and went through a 4 hour surgery. This included staples to the back of his head where he fractured his skull. The surgery also removed fractured bone from his C6 and the doctor's fused his C5, C6, and C7 vertebrae. Afterwards, an MRI was done and it showed that his spinal cord was injured at the C6 level with swelling above and below. He has been unable to fully breathe on his own and is scheduled to get a tracheotomy on Tuesday. The trach will allow him to start therapies to get stronger so he can get off of the ventilator which is currently keeping him alive. As of today, Elliott is paralyzed and has the inability to feel most of his trunk and his legs and has very limited movement of his arms. He remains in the Providence Pediatric ICU, until his breathing is able to be stabilized. Once Elliott has become comfortable with his trach settings, no longer needs blood pressure meds, and is participating in therapies, he'll be considered medically stable. This will allow him to be accepted to an out of state facility. We are really hoping he gets accepted to Craig Hospital in Englewood, Colorado which specializes in spinal cord injury rehabilitation. Alaska does not have the resources he needs to rehabilitate locally.

I can’t say enough great things about my nephew. He is kind, smart, ambitious, hard working, funny, handsome and just all around a great young man. He had just got his driver's license and he was really looking forward to going to his first prom. Outside of school and sports, he worked as an ETT and loved his job very much. Also, as a type 1 diabetic diagnosed when he was 6, has been a mentor to other young kids like him. Our family wants nothing but for Elliott to have the best opportunities for him to live an amazing life with as many chances as possible for him to excel like he did before his accident. He deserves it so much.

Elliott’s parents Laura Greet and Matt Honkola individually make a modest income. Laura is a contract nurse in Anchorage, and my brother Matt is a commercial fisherman/construction worker in Cordova. Neither one of them will be able to take paid leave and Elliott will need full time care moving forward. How full time care will happen is still yet to be determined. Financial stress is not a factor we want to be a burden on them. The donations will help provide financial stress relief for his parents so they can focus on Elliott’s recovery and be with him when it is most crucial in the months ahead. Currently, Laura's health insurance only pays for 40% inpatient rehabilitation. The average stay for inpatient treatment at Craig is 73 days. The average charge for rehabilitation is $449,413.53. This comes to an average of $6,156.35 per day. Laura's insurance will cover approximately $73,876.20 of the first 30 days. This does not include travel, hotel, home expenses, and food for his parents. Any extra funds will provide Elliott things like durable medical equipment, accessible transportation, accessible modifications to his Mom and Dad's house and continuous intensive therapy that is not covered by insurance. All donations will go directly to his Mom, Laura.

Any amount will help and encouraging positive messages are greatly appreciated during this extremely difficult time. I will post updates of Elliott's progress on this page.

Thank You,

Elliott's Family