Levi Wright, the 3-year-old son of rodeo star Spencer Wright, died after being taken off life support, family friend and spokesperson Mindy Sue Clark shared on Facebook on Monday. Levi was sedated and on a breathing machine for 12 days after suffering a serious brain injury as a result of accidentally driving his toy tractor into a Utah river on May 21, according to People. “After several sleepless nights, a lot of research, multiple conversations with the best neurologists in the world [and] millions of prayers that we stand here in the face of our greatest fear,” the boy’s mother, Kallie Wright, wrote on June 2. Facebook post in which she shared that her family made the difficult decision to “[let] he goes.
Here’s what you should know about Levi’s story.
What happened to Levi?
After driving his toy tractor into a Utah river, the boy was pulled from the water and “life-saving measures were administered at the scene” by emergency crews, according to a press release shared on Facebook. Facebook by the Beaver County Sheriff’s Department. It’s unclear whether Levi hit his head in the accident or inhaled water. He was taken to Beaver Valley Hospital and later transferred to Primary Children’s Hospital in Salt Lake City, where he remained in critical condition.
Family friend Clark shared via Facebook on May 22 that Levi’s heart was “beating on its own,” according to E! News. Clark added that the boy “has the urge to breathe, but his sweet brain has been without oxygen for too long and there’s no going back.” She continued: “We hugged him all night and felt strongly that his spirit is no longer with us. We can’t be selfish and drag this out for days, he doesn’t deserve this. Soon we will stop caring for him and keep him close until his last breath on earth.”
Doctors monitored Levi’s brain activity using a electroencephalogram (EEG), according to another update posted by Clark. But there has been little change, Kallie wrote in Facebooknoting that her son “didn’t hold up well” when doctors tried to wean him from sedation. He was sedated again to keep him “comfortable” and underwent another MRI, she wrote.
But on June 2, the family made the decision to withdraw life support.
What type of brain injury can cause this?
Clark’s first update, explaining that Levi’s brain has been without oxygen for a long time, suggests that he has developed cerebral hypoxia. “Although there is little information about what occurred, it appears that the incident resulted in the loss of necessary oxygen to the brain, the effects of which could be devastating,” he said. Dr., a neurologist at Providence Mission Hospital, told Yahoo Life. “The brain can only be without oxygen for a few minutes before certain brain cells begin to experience hypoxia or anoxia. They then start to die.” The condition of someone with cerebral hypoxia can deteriorate quickly, according to the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.
The Wright family noted that while Levi was sedated, doctors worked hard to keep his body cool and combat fever-like symptoms, an approach that Gee says is used to help protect the brain and other organs after an injury. traumatic. However, “if there is a prolonged loss of oxygen to the brain, the effects can be global,” explains Gee. “If brain activity remains silent and important brain stem activity is lost, the brain may be in a state of brain death.”
Alternatively, they may still have activity on their brainstem – which controls basic vital functions such as breathing, consciousness and heart rate – but the person may be in a “persistent vegetative state,” says Gee.
What causes cerebral hypoxia?
It can result from a number of health problems and accidents, according to Mount Sinai. These include drowning, suffocation, smoke inhalation, airway obstruction and diseases such as ALS.
“Although I do not know the details of this tragic case, it appears that nearly two weeks have passed since Levi Wright [had his accident]which is enough time to determine a long-term prognosis,” Dr.emergency physician, founder and president of EMSEC, told Yahoo Life.
How common is this?
Accidents are main cause of death between children aged 14 and under, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. It is a 2019 study (led by a leading expert in pediatric neurocritical care) found that brain death occurred in more than 20% of deaths among children admitted to pediatric intensive care units. Most of them, according to the study, occurred due to cutting off oxygen supply in children or babies.
