What was I supposed to tell a kid without scaring him off or making me feel uncomfortable? As a kid, were you ever embarrassingly honest? To the point where you completely mortified your mother? That was totally me. We all know that kids say the darnedestthings, when we hear an alarmingly honest comment from anyone [...]
"Trach", a film with a whole lot of love, brings you into the lives of three children with tracheostomies. An intimate look into Corinna, Liam and Alia's daily challenges shows their courage as well as the inherent strength of their guardians. This documentary was co-directed by Jose Cota and Sean Devin, filmmakers out [...]
Photo left to right standing: Cindy, Aaron and Richard. Sitting: Anthony, Natasha and Eric. My name is Cindy Bissell. I live in Grafton, MA with my husband Richard and our four children. All four children have special needs. Our twins were born 3 1/2 months early on July 28, 1993. Both have special [...]
Look who made President Barack Obama's instagram news feed! It's Isaac, the five year old boy featured on the cover of our GTC brochure & website. Isaac and his family were invited to the White House to hear the President speak about the Affordable Care Act. Isaac had met his "lifetime" maximum insurance coverage at [...]
Our featured patient-family story this month is from Dana King, otherwise known as “Trach Chic” in our global tracheostomy community. Dana shares her journey about what life is like with her tracheostomy, which she calls her “enabling disability”. We hope that you find her story as inspiring as we do at the GTC, and invite [...]
The following family story was written and shared by Whitney Baugh: “Justin and I were high school sweethearts who married young after dating for several years. I gave birth to our first child, Bryson, in 2008. In 2011, we welcomed a daughter, Bella. In 2013, Brynlee made her appearance and took us by complete surprise [...]
My name is Jay M. Trivedi. I am a 22.5 adult diagnosed with CCHS (Congenital Central Hypoventilation Syndrome) and HD (Hirschprungs Disease). Due to the CCHS rare syndrome, I have a trachea and it has prevented me from traveling abroad to India and has prevented me from swimming. I am currently and have been an [...]
Samantha has cerebral palsy,and has always had breathing issues. She was born 13 weeks prematurely, and has been dealing with asthma and noisy breathing all her life. When she was 10 years old, she started to snore...badly. After visiting the ENT, the decision was made to remove her tonsils and adenoids. It didn't help, the [...]
A letter to Linda L. Morris, a Clinical Nurse Specialist in Respiratory Care at the Northwestern Memorial Hospital: Hi Linda, This is a photo of my Mom with her four grandkids. The picture was taken soon after she left the hospital in December 2012. Mom was diagnosed with Stage III cancer of the larynx in [...]