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By April Hunt |
Royal Oak, Michigan: Premier surgeons explaining their latest triumph aren't usually upstaged by squealing and giggling. But two of William Beaumont Hospital's most respected doctors took it in stride recently when rambunctious 1-year-old Demetri James of Antigua stole their show.
Dr. Michael Gellis, Beaumont's head of plastic surgery, and Dr. Ghaus Malik, the hospital's director of neurosurgery, laughed along with the crowd as they explained a surgery that corrected the tot's rare brain birth defect and he galloped through the room in a tiny Red Wings jersey.
Demetri played "gotcha" with his Livonia host family and laughingly entertained himself with ink pens and paper as the doctors told the tale of the surgery meant to change his life forever. Demetri came to Royal Oak four months ago as part of "Healing the Children," a humanitarian group dedicated to finding medical help for ailing foreign children. When he arrived at Detroit Metropolitan Airport in February, Demetri had a birth defect called an "encephalocele" that occurs when the bones in the head fail to fuse properly and brain tissue protrudes through the skull. The defect left a growth the size of a small potato on his forehead and spaced his eyes uncomfortably apart.
It's a rare condition, occurring in one of every 10,000 births, and Beaumont doctors estimate they've handled less than a dozen such cases in the last 30 years. But they were eager to help spirited Demetri. Doctors and staff members volunteered their skills and Beaumont donated its facilities for the surgery.
"This (surgery) is not done in many places in the world," Dr. Gellis said, adding "We are lucky."
Dr. Malik removed the growth through a hole in the boy's cranium during a 10-hour surgery in March and Dr. Gellis repositioned his eye sockets to improve his vision and appearance.
"He did very well," Dr. Gellis said. "He will go on to lead a normal life. He now has a good chance that as he grows, the bones will meld together."
Without the surgery, Demetri would have had serious vision difficulties, the doctors said, loss of smell, and a permanent facial abnormality. Now, he'll grow like any other child, doctors said, and probably never need another surgery. That was good news to his host family, the Goddards of Livonia, who were lauded for treating Demetri like their own son the last four months.
"He's been so good the whole time," said Ken Goddard, 45, who helped his wife Kathy care for the boy. "He slept well all along, he played, he's a great kid ."The Goddards have three children, 16, 15 and 9, and all said they were sad to see their adopted little brother head back home.
"It's been fun having him here," said Kendall Goddard, 15, as she held a wriggling Demetri on her hip. "We will miss him."
The Goddards took care of Demetri 24 hours a day, drove to all his doctor appointments, anxiously waited out his surgery in Beaumont's corridors, threw him a first birthday party, called his Caribbean family every two weeks to update his progress, handled all the follow-up appointments and introduced him to some uniquely American experiences.
"Cheese puffs," Ken Goddard said. "That's what he loves to eat. He was used to eating certain types of food when he got here and it was tough to find things he would eat. But now he's probably somewhat Americanized."