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Cook Children's
@cookchildrens

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Caleb Ray was celebrating his 18th birthday on a cruise when he developed a fever and began to experience pain. His family knew the pain was likely associated with sickle cell disease, which he has lived with since being diagnosed shortly after birth. However, none of the normal remedies Caleb used to treat a sickle cell pain episode gave any relief. After arriving home, his pain grew so severe that his family took him to the Emergency Department (ED) at Cook Children’s Medical Center where he was admitted to the hospital. Shortly after, Caleb’s lungs, liver and kidneys began to fail. He was transferred to Cook Children’s Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU) where he was placed on a ventilator to support his breathing, and continuous dialysis to rid his body of the buildup of toxins from kidney failure. His prognosis was grim. A battery of tests revealed that Caleb’s life-threatening sickle cell crisis was triggered by a common childhood virus called Epstein-Barr (EBV). “The Epstein-Barr virus triggered something called EBV-induced sickle hepatopathy,” said Clarissa Johnson, M.D., hematologist and SCD specialist at Cook Children’s. “Essentially, that is a condition where you can develop acute liver failure, which he did. And when you develop liver failure, it can affect other organs, including your kidneys.” With the support of his family and Cook Children's care team, Caleb Ray overcame the odds stacked against him to survive a life-threatening sickle cell crisis. Visit the link in our bio to read Caleb’s story. #SickleCellAwarenessMonth #SickleCellDisease #SCD