A Cuban mother is in a desperate situation, and has turned to social networks to ask for help from the community, as she needs a special mattress for her son who is at risk of never walking again.
The woman, identified as Tania Marine and a resident of the Bayamo community, turned to Facebook to ask for help for her little son, Olek Gutiérrez, who has a condition that has damaged his hip bones and limbs.
In her publication, the woman explained that the little boy, just 8 years old, has already had seven surgeries performed on his hip, and portions of bone have been removed, so he faces severe difficulties walking on his own.
“He has avascular necrosis, they had to cut the bone more, the leg was much shorter,” explained his mother.
The little boy was a victim of medical negligence in Cuban hospitals, because after suffering a hip dislocation in 2022 that could be remedied with minor surgery, the hospitals refused to treat him, citing the “bad situation in the country.”
As the mother explained, the doctors tried to convince her to look for other alternatives, since “the crisis” did not allow her surgery to be performed because “it was not an emergency.”
Thus, the mother waited a whole year for the surgery to be approved, and it was this untreated injury that caused necrosis in the little boy’s hip, who, due to not having been attended to in time, has now had to be admitted seven times – six more than originally needed – to the operating room.
“He (has to) have the blades for two years, the femur is very damaged, they bite it and it falls apart. It must be treated like gold, the slightest movement or a fall will dislodge the bone and there is no remedy. Until he is a man, he has surgery and puts in prosthetics, and here in Cuba he is not doing it,” explained her mother, 32 years old.
For now, the little one needs a special anti-decubitus mattress, “because he will have to be unable to move for at least two years.” Her mother and those close to her ask for financial help to carry out the treatment, and in comments, some have suggested that they seek a humanitarian visa to treat him in the United States.
Avascular necrosis is the death of bone tissue due to lack of blood supply, and can produce anything from small fractures in the bone to its collapse, in a process that, without treatment, varies between months and several years.
The condition occurs when blood flow to a bone is interrupted or reduced, which may be due to bone trauma, or an injury, such as in this case joint dislocation, that damages nearby blood vessels.
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