[infoster]

We are trying to adopt a baby girl born less than a week ago. She is still in the Hospital because she had a stroke two days after birth and the Doctors told our agency that she had a blod clot on her heart which triggered some seizures and then the stroke. She is under observatiomn at the moment, but uis moving her legs, arms and acting as if nothing had happened. The Doctors are telling the agency that we will not know if the stroke has caused any diabilities until she gets to the age where she needs to be sitting up, crawling...They won't tell us anything else. Can anyone give us an idea of what to expect? The Doctors only told us that she could have something as small as learning disabilities to cerebral palsy. Has anyone here had experinece with a child who has had a stroke? Birthmom was drug free, alcohol free...Would she be elligible for Medicaid or any kind of special needs help? Thank-you for any advice or information...Teresa

[sstuart]

I do not know about the Medicare or medicaid aspect, but often times when an infant has a stroke they recover with very little limitations. Since their brain is still forming they overcome the damaged area and another area takes over and you can barely tell that there is a problem at all. Of course no one can tell what the problems will ultimately be. Only time will tell. You would have to wait to find out the long term effects it may have had.

[mumofone]

An online friend adopted a newborn baby who had a stroke inutero. I believe is is close to 7 now and did have a few issues with gross motor delays and is now experiencing seizures.

It is so hard to predict how much (or if any) damage has been done until they are a bit older where they are supposed to be meeting milestones.

Good luck.

[momraine]

I think in this case, you have to be willing to accept the worst, but hope for the best. As for as medicaid, I don't know, they probably won't do anything until the child actually shows some disabilities. However, your private insurance (if you have it) should cover the child from the time you adopt them as if the child was born to you. Only you can decide what you are willing to accept. Personally I would go for it, but we set out to adopt special needs, so I am different. If you can commit to this child no matter what the future may bring then go for it. If not, maybe you should let someone else take this one. Only you know what your family can handle.

[DannieAS]

sorry to not be so definative but like pp above said, you have to expect the worst and hope for the best. I've worked with children who have had strokes and a couple of them were severly impacted and 3 of them had little setbacks. It does depend on which area was affected in the brain.

[jphollen]

FS was born with a severe heart defect. He had a stroke at 18 months. While he has minimal physical issues, he has severe mental and emotional ones (attributed to the stroke for the most part).

[proudmommyof 2]

If cerebral palsy is the worst case scenario--

You can get medical assistance for her. Generally, though, you have to show mental disabilities to do this, but if the child has physical limitations and needs PT, etc., you'll be able to get it. Our dd's medical assistance pays for thousands of $$ a month for PT, OT, etc., wheelchairs, walkers, crutches, and braces.

Ds has medical assistance for mental disabilities, and gets his ST paid for.

This is after our private insurance exhausts their yearly quota, which happens in about Feb. every year...

If medical insurance is your only concern....go for it!

[saranbr]

The baby's doctors are correct-- perinatal stroke has variable outcomes. The last time I pulled the literature on the subject, the outcomes were more good than bad probably due to the plasticity of the newborn brain. That said, they are also correct in that you will not know the full impact until he/she is or is not meeting milestones. I agree with what others have expressed: hope for the best but you must be willing to take on the worst.

One other thing-- have they finished the hemetology work up to find out why this happened? They don't always find the answer, but if this infant has a significant clotting disorder you would want to know that as well as the outcomes/treatment options for it.

[athikers]

My son incurred brain damage at 7 weeks old. His life is severely impacted by this. He has just now learned to walk (2 years old), he does not talk, he does not eat and he acts like... maybe a 9 month old in the way he plays and interacts with people.

Stroke is brain injury, though different from my sons, certainly. But, please do not assume everything will be okay just because she seems normal now. My son seemed fine until he was around 4 months old, since that time he has proven to have been severely impacted by his injuries.

That said, he is a sweet, loveable little boy, despite these things. Just consider what your family is willing and able to deal with long term as you make this choice.

Good luck!

Also, as pp have said... if your daughter were to end up severely disabled she would be covered by medical assistance.

[qs mom]

I have a co-worker with twin grandsons. One of them had a stroke in the first week or so of life. The other did not.

The child who had the stroke has trouble with muscle tone and use on one side of his body. He has had botox injections and is doing fairly well. He is 5 and in normal kingergarten. He does have heat induced seizures.

The other child, had no stroke and is being evaluated for autism spectrum disorders.

So, you just don't know.

[Lupin]

Ok so this child's medical problems are fairly different from my own son's history, so Ill first tell you his particulars & then what we know about his "Future"

During Labour & Delivery my son had a Stroke. Specifically what they call IVH, or Intra-Ventricular Hemorrhage, also in layman's "Brain Bleed". Details are it's Left Hemisphere frontal Ventricle.

I believe when the Dr. was giving him his very first check up he was having a seizure. I could see him from where we were and his head was turned in the way that I'ld later know as his "Head Posturing seizure" yeah the Dr. seriously dropped the ball, I still hear her saying "Oh Look he's so strong he has his head turned and won't let me turn it back." Something then told me something was wrong, there are numerous infant illnesses that present themselves as "Advanced Physical ability/muscle tone". Over the next 40 hours I was trying to get the Dr.'s & nurses to listen to me that he was having seizures, they kept telling me no that he was perfectly fine & normal. Our check out exam consisted of the same Dr. who delivered my son standing 15' away from me and asking us how we felt, and then walking away. I had a tore severely, and after I had been sewn up never looked at again. Also during the first 24 hours of my son's life his seizures were much easier to tell something was wrong, it is not normal for a newborn to be able to hold it's head up for 10-15 minutes, looking in one direction no matter which way you turn or hold them, that is the head posturing seizure, in a Newborn it's the most blatantly obvious and it's apparently the "Early Stage" seizures, when things aren't incredibly serious. but by the next morning my son was having what we used to call half body Grande Mal's. They now call it a "Focal Point" seizure. That in a new born yes is harder to tell, since it looks alot like he's just flailing around, and newborns don't have the muscle control otherwise, but the eyes twitch and the limbs affected by the seizure move in a "Cyclic" pattern, think of a bike wheel. We were realeased from the hospital. and at 48 hours old we had him in the Er, and My mom with us, they still were not wanting to believe us that something was wrong. We had even brought my mom so that they would be less likely to go "Oh first time parents being paranoid again". But finally we did get them to listen, and man did they hop!!
Our son left the hospital once they had the seizures under control and found the reason was the IVH, we were warned he might develop "Secondary Hydrocephalus" in layman's "Water on the Brain". And he did. So once we realized something was wrong, and stopped thinking we were being paranoid first time parents, he had to go through emergency Neurosurgery to install/insert a VP Shunt (ventriculoperitoneal). There are many probable complications from this thing, and there is less than a 1% chance of it ever being removed, whether removal is a good thing or bad, and it will most likely get replaced many times during his life.


Ok so half rant half details aside. We were straight up told that they may never find the reason why a baby born at 40 weeks 5 days(and a healthy 9lbs7oz) would have a "Preemie Problem" apparently these things are stupidly common in Premature(& low birth weight) babies.

The complications from his stroke will be only told as time goes on, and may actually not rear their ugly head until an adult, if anyone can even tell at that time. ADD/ADHD, any number of learning difficulties, or social/mental/emotional difficulties anything may be there, and may be minor or severe, but the more time that passes the less severe they difficulties should be. The reason is that unlike an adults brain a newborn's brain is Highly elastic, meaning that it not only has incredible abilities to heal itself, but also rearrange itself, unlike not only adults but even small children and toddlers. As we age from Birth our brain has less ability to "Fix" itself in what ever way it would be able to. In other words the closer to birth your child is when it happens the better the future outcome for less side effects. The Dr.'s will tell you the worst, because if for what ever reason the baby doesn't do as well as they/you hoped, it will hurt even worse, but if you feel that there is no hope, and you are given the universe, well you are going to be much happier/better. You need to work to prevent the worse, because even one with out obstacles can have them placed in their way. Always fight to overcome what ever may try to lurk there, which if you don't know & accept is possible, you want try to ward it off.

Personally with this child I wouldn't be so worried about it's Stroke as the damage done by the clot in the heart. My son is brought into a Dr./ER for almost anything, they worry it might have to do with his head/stroke/hydrocephalus and he is seen immediately by the top people present, and they will (have) call back people from hundreds of miles away.I have a little cousin born with a severe undetected before birth heart defect/problem, and she will have to wait. I would also expect that this child will be coming home on some sort of anti-seizure medicine, which hopefully they may get to come off of before their second birthday. At 17 months my son is almost fully weaned from his.

I would think the only real reasons not to adopt this child is if they're not disclosing everything possible, like what they can guarantee to be a problem. The best can't be guaranteed, but the worse can, again just because you're not to expect better doesn't mean you can't have. But other than that, if this was to have happened to a child you yourself carried, would you be able to deal?

Edited to add: My husband and I have been discussing these "Special Needs" and have said we'd gladly take the chance again, if the adoptive situation presented itself. Our son is classified "Special Needs" at this point in time, and always will be, but most people wouldn't believe it, far less that he's a cyborg!!

[jackiedw]

My son Noah is now 16 months. He had a perinatal stroke during pregnancy or during labor and delivery. We don't know for sure. We don't know why either but, both of us have a tendency to have blood clots. He was discovered to have seizures shortly after birth and the area of brain damage from a blood clot was discovered upon an MRI. He has a very small area of brain damage on his right temporal lobe. He has not had any more seizures since his first week of life and has been off medication since he was 2 months old. He is developing normally. He rolled over at 4 months, sat up at 6 months, crawled at 8 months, walked at 13 months, and he is now running all over the place without any sign of a delay or any weakness. He knows 20 baby "signs", and speaks a few words. He is extremely observant and curious, and understands most things that I tell him. The first year was scary because the outcome was unknown. Now I know that Noah will be fine. There is still a small chance for a learning delay or behavioral problems, but I predict that they will be mild if any at all. A babies brain is so "platic" that it can overcome an area of injury by remapping around that area. Often another part of the brain takes over the functions of the damaged part. We are lucky that the right temporal lobe doesn't have that many vital functions. The neurologist said it is the best place to have a stroke. It controls emotion and some types of memory. It is more of the abstract part of the brain. We feel very lucky that the clot didn't go to another part of the brain. The doctors may tell you that it is hard to get a clear image from an MRI on a newborn's brain because there is so much fluid on the brain at that age. Noah had another MRI at 6 months and they got a much better image which showed that the stroke was a lot smaller than previously thought. It also showed that that part of the brain was getting smaller as the dead area was being reasorbed. Prepare yourself for a lot of tests and blood work to rule out any other problems. We had a ton of tests, lab work, dr's appointments the first year. Now the storm has passed and life seems more normal. There are so many children out there with severe illnesses and disabilities that it makes our problem seem minor. Your little girl will be lucky to have your concern and your love as she starts her journey in life. Good luck.

[sunshinemommy]

I'm definitely not an expert, but I just wanted to give you some good news. My father suffered a stroke as an infant and was a preemie.

He had no serious complications and is a well educated respected man.

Good luck!

[Dickons]

I have had a stroke which took my language center out...now when I speak/write it is my right brain that works instead of my left side. Knowing where the stroke happened will give you insight into the possible issues.

Plasticity of the brain is amazing...I was 43 and although sometimes I don't say/write something correctly (how I would have said it before) if you listen carefully you can figure out my meaning even if the words are not quite right. I wasn't supposed to get back as much as I have. Immediate rehab, ongoing hard work, and my early music training are what I believe (and studies have shown) helped me.

Find out the area of the brain that is damaged and then research, learn how the brain works, and talk to stroke survivors, those will be your best info.

Also, try to ensure your doctors have done everything they can to find the cause of the blood clot...it could be something like a PFO with the blood flow going in the wrong direction which can be fixed to prevent future strokes or it could be a condition where you will need to monitor your child.

Kind regards,
Dickons