Jade DeLucia, 4, spent the holidays fighting to survive after flu complications left her brain damaged.
DES MOINES — Jade DeLucia started the holiday season a healthy 4-year-old girl, causing trouble with her 5-year-old sister in Waterloo, Iowa.Her mother, Amanda Phillips, said Jade felt sick for a few days leading up to Christmas. Jade had a low-grade fever and a bit of a runny nose, but nothing that caused alarm.
When the girls' father, Stephen, went to wake the girls up at 8 a.m. on Christmas Eve, Jade was unresponsive.The family rushed Jade to Covenant Medical Center, where she tested positive for the flu in the emergency room. A nurse treating Jade asked Phillips and her husband whether they were sure their daughter wasn't faking. A few minutes later, Jade had a seizure. Hospital staff used a crash cart to revive her.
Phillips said it took about four hours to stabilize her daughter enough that she could be airlifted to the University of Iowa Stead Family Children's Hospital.Jade continued to have episodes of seizurelike shaking. After four days, doctors concluded from an MRI that influenza had traveled to her brain, causing swelling that led her body to attack itself and leaving her with brain damage.
Jade spent more than two weeks at the hospital, and her family is now focused on recovery at home. They are also adapting to a new challenge: the damage to Jade's brain from the flu has left her blind.
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