Mom Posts Photo Of Her 3-Year-Old To FB, Friends Urge Her To Rush To ER
By Dreamer
When a proud mom posted a photo of her adorable three year old daughter’s new hairdo to Facebook, she expected to receive an outpouring of ooohs and ahhhhs over just how cute the girl looked.
Instead, she received a flood of comments about something strange happening with the girl that her mother had overlooked. When mom took her daughter to the doctor to look into it more closely, it was discovered that the little girl had a rare disease that could have claimed her vision. Read on to hear how social media spared a child from going blind.
When Nashville-area mom Tara Taylor posted a photo of her three year old to Facebook, her friends and family responded less about Rylee’s new hairdo and more about how the glare in Rylee’s left eye didn’t look normal. When it became the focus of the comments section, Tara decided to take Rylee to see a specialist.
Rylee was diagnosed with Coats disease by Dr. Jorge Calzada with the Charles Retina Institute and Baptist Eye Clinic. Coats disease is a rare disease that causes vision loss or blindness in one eye.
“The significant problem we have with children is that a child won’t say, ‘Mommy, I can’t see out of my right eye.’ It is usually caught in an expected way. When a child recognizes he cannot see or the parent recognizes they cannot see, it’s often because they’ve lost vision in both eyes,” said Dr. Calzada.
Rylee is currently undergoing treatment for Coats disease that will lessen or even stop the loss of vision in her left eye. The incident with the Taylor family spurred a generous donation to the eye clinic. Baptist Eye Clinic received a $550,000 grant from the Baptist Memorial Health Care foundation to fund a state of the art eye clinic at the Women’s Hospital. The eye clinic treats children and even premature babies.
According to The Jack McGovern Coats Disease Foundation: “Coats disease is a very rare condition found in children and adults where there is abnormal development in the blood vessels behind the retina of the eye. The blood-rich retinal capillaries break open, leaking the serum portion of the blood into the back of the eye. The leakage causes the retina to swell, leading to partial or complete detachment of the retina. Coats disease progresses gradually and affects central vision. It is almost always unilateral (affecting only one eye). If caught early, some level of vision can typically be restored. If not treated until its later stages, complete loss of vision can occur. In the final stage, enucleation (removal of the affected eye) may be necessary.
“It’s estimated that about 69 percent of the cases are male. The average age at diagnosis is 8–16 years, although the disease has been diagnosed in patients as young as 4 months. The peak age of onset is between 6-8 years of age, but ranges from 5 months to 71 years. About two-thirds of juvenile cases present before age 10 years; approximately one-third of patients are 30 years or older before symptoms begin. Coats disease does not appear to be inherited and has no reported racial or ethnic predilection.
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