Ash - Back Surgery

Hi Everyone,

We are re-opening this blog after 7 years.....so we can try to keep people up to date with Ashling's up-coming surgery. This was our blog for the first years of Ashling's life and it has been dormant for quite a while now.

Ashling heads into hospital this Tuesday to prepare for Bi-Polar back surgery, aimed at helping to straighten her spine. As many of you know Ashling's scoliosis has progressed aggressively over the past 18 months. As much as we would love to, it won't be possible to keep everyone updated individually so we are going to try add updates to this blog when possible. You will be able to leave comments here too, which will be an easier way for us to stay in contact when we can, rather than by emails or texts.

We think that this blog will also help keep Ashling entertained somewhat (but visits would be great too!!!). Being the person that she is she, Ash would love to hear from you and we will endeavor to get her to add posts herself even if this is a bit "old-school" now!!!

The plan is that Ash will go into surgery on Wednesday and have a halo attached to her head, which will then be used to lengthen and stretch her spine slowly over a few weeks using a weight system. This will begin to straighten her back, as well as help make her surgery more successful.

Then Ashling is having a new spinal surgery in a few weeks (no definite date yet) which will be done by an Australian Surgeon, assisted by her spinal surgeon here at Starship, Dr John Ferguson. This is the fist time that this surgery will be done in New Zealand, which is why they are flying a surgeon over to do it. Ashling is pretty special indeed!!!

If you would like to know more about Halo Traction, this is a video that we were given the link to, in order to explain it to Ash. It is really good. But beware that this hospital in Texas specializes in this and so Ashling's equipment and therapy will not be as "Cool". But this is a good idea of its appearance and function.

Halo traction video


Thank you all for your prayers and love.
Lots of love,
Ger and Caroline