Luka’s Story:
Our boy Luka was born with VACTERL association. For those of you that don’t know VACTERL stands for vertebral defects, anal atresia, cardiac defects, tracheo-esophageal fistula, renal anomalies, and limb abnormalities. People diagnosed with VACTERL association typically have at least 3 of these characteristic features. Luka was born with 8.
When Luka was born he was seeing 8 doctors. He is now down to 6. In his short 4 years of life he has had 7 surgeries & is expected at least 4 more. Two of them being his hand.
Luka’s most noticeable anomaly is his right radial club hand. He was born without his right radial bone along with his right thumb causing his arm to be shorter and his wrist to be turned in. He only has full use of his pinky finger on that hand.
The surgeries that Luka would be getting are - Ulnarization & Pollicization. There are only 2 doctors in the US that do these surgeries & they are both in Florida.
Ulnarization - Ulnarization is a surgery used to correct the deformity and achieving normal alignment of the wrist. In this surgery, the hand and carpus are moved to the ulnar side (little finger side) of the ulna. The deforming forces around the hand and wrist are converted to stabilizing forces by using the distal ulna (weight-bearing part of the wrist joint) as a fulcrum (balancing point).
Pollicization - Pollicization of the thumb is a reconstructive hand surgery that creates a functional thumb. They will be moving his right index finger to where his right thumb should have been.
These two surgeries cannot be done at the same time. Which means we will be flying to Florida multiple times in the next few months.
His first surgery requires us to stay in Florida for 2 weeks.
We as parents want to give him the best possible chance at living a “normal” life. Between the 2 surgeries & multiple different braces this process will take 4-5 months until he can have full use of his right hand/arm. Along with therapy sessions during & after recovery.
We are holding a benefit at the Elks Club to help pay medical bills, flights, car rentals etc. Any tricky tray donations are being accepted! Reach out to Taylor or Matt Corra to schedule a pickup/drop off time & day. Attached is a go-fund me link for people that are not able to attend the benefit.
We appreciate it from the bottom of our hearts! Thank you all ❤️
https://gofund.me/3ec33d7ca
Also check out other Nonprofit events in Hazleton.
