Every story mattersNeeds a kidney
Help Levi Smith’s story reach someone new.
Levi is a 2 year old who has been on nightly peritoneal dialysis since he was a few days old. At a glance, he looks like your typical toddler, running around, climbing, and playing. You would never know that during our routine 20 week anatomy scan we discovered Levi had cysts all over both of his kidneys, a very enlarged bladder, and very little amniotic fluid around him. We were advised to either terminate the pregnancy or continue carrying him knowing he likely would only survive for minutes to hours when he was born. We asked our MFM to look into other options. Luckily she found the RAFT trial at The John’s Hopkins Hospital and their Fetal Therapy Team got us in right away for an evaluation. After further testing, they approved us to receive amnioinfusions to replace the amniotic fluid around him so that his lungs would be able to develop.
Levi was born at 34 weeks and had his first surgery when he was just 2 days old to place his peritoneal dialysis catheter and a broviac central line. We spent around 3.5 months in the NICU during which he had an additional 2 surgeries before we went home. In Levi’s first year of life he had 5 trips in total to the OR for various operations. Despite all of the challenges and hardships Levi has faced in his short life he continues to fight and to bring joy to everyone he meets. When we go to the hospital he waves at every person he passes with a smile and says hi. Receiving a kidney transplant will give him the opportunity to just be a normal kid and to inspire others to keep pushing on.
You can become Levi’s Human Angel Living Kidney Donor by contacting the Johns Hopkins Transplant Program at 410-614-9345
Life in pictures
