A Response from Unity Point/Blank Children's Hospital

Yesterday, I posted my third and final attempt at contacting Unity Point/Blank Children's via their VP and CEO. Although, I never did get an official response from they themselves, the President and COO at Blank Children's Hospital contacted me to address my concerns. 

I have to be cordial in saying that he was a polite man but he advised me he was going to tell me what I didn't want to hear. I already knew that.... but I wanted to be heard. Not ignored. This is a child we are talking about.

The facts are: Unity Point/Blank Children's opposes the CBD Bill here in Iowa and will not consider backing it until the FDA Approves it. 

I get it. It's big business and big pharma and there is nothing that I can do about it to change anyone's mind.

It's just sad that parents and physicians aren't able to make choices for their children and their patients without policies blocking their way. My son has suffered enough. He has been through three years of absolute hell in dealing with the medical world from the very day he was born.

It doesn't matter that they don't know how to treat his Rare Chromosome Disorder. It doesn't matter that they didn't know how to treat him when we come into the ER with collapsing spells. It doesn't matter that they put him through unneccesary IVs and starve him for hours and hours for tests that never happened due to the fact that no one wanted to call our neurologist to find out he'd just had an MRI.

It doesn't matter that he's only 3 and that we have to travel out of town and out-of-state to get the help that we need. It doesn't matter that his own Neurologist who has been seeing him since he was 10 months old won't sign an card to ensure that we won't go to jail for giving him a medicine that comes from a plant.

It doesn't matter that he's got a massive kidney and that a good portion of anti-convulsant medications are out due to the fact that they are metabolized in the kindeys. It doesn't matter that the only two medications that we have been advised are our last options can make him go backwards and lose the skills that he has worked so hard to gain.

It doesn't matter that he's had to be in multiple therapies since before he could crawl - just so he was able to sit up. It doesn't matter that at 3 he still cannot even say Mama or that he can't feed himself because his pincer grasp is just now starting to work.

It doesn't matter that the mass in his brain makes him feel pressure in his head so badly he'll slam his head into his crib for hours. It doesn't matter that the pressure from the mass in his neck that has been ignored for months has made him start hitting himself in the head and ear.

None of what my son has gone through or will go through matters to them. They will not back the CBD Bill until the FDA Approves it. Which could take decades. THESE KIDS DON'T HAVE YEARS TO WAIT. 

But you know what? It doesn't matter that my kid doesn't matter to them.

It doesn't matter that they told me No. It doesn't matter that our Neurologist doesn't have the guts to do what is right. It doesn't matter that our own Physician and our own Politicians have even advised us to do it anyway.

None of that matters.

He is my son. HE MATTERS. I am going to fight to get him access to a medicine that could literally change his world. THAT IS WHAT MATTERS. KIDS MATTER. LIVES MATTER.

---