"If it wasn’t for Dr. Brigger, our OT, my husband and Sage fighting, we would have never gotten to where we are today. We were a true team."
“To be honest, we just wanted to do whatever we could to keep Sage alive,” Kimberly says. “If it wasn’t for Dr. Brigger, our occupational therapist, Anne Mazzeo, my husband and Sage fighting, we would have never gotten to where we are today. We were a true team.” While Sage was learning to feed properly, he was still awaiting surgery to repair his tracheal rings. Ideally, he would have been at least 6 months old at the time of surgery so he could be bigger and stronger, but he was
a sudden, he would stop breathing and then choke. Any way we sliced and diced it, it wasn’t working for him,” Kimberly says. At 4 months and 2 days old, Sage underwent his second major surgery, this time to repair the tracheal rings. “IT GOT WORSE BEFORE IT GOT BETTER” The period after surgery was the hardest in Sage’s journey. “This was a super traumatic time in our lives,” Kimberly says. “He was just in such critical condition for a week. For at least three or four days he was completely para- lyzed under anesthesia. He didn’t even look like my child.” Still, through all the trauma, Kimberly was grateful to have the team at Rady Children’s by her family’s side.
still having such a hard time feeding, the family knew that they had to act faster. “Around early August, we shared our con- cerns with Dr. Brigger. Sage just couldn’t gain weight, and his breathing was really labored—it sounded like a rattle, and all of
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abnormality, or their digestion doesn’t work because of it,” he continues. “We realized there should be a more cohesive way to manage these problems. We offer the best services to kids that have these multifactorial
Children’s from as far away as Alaska and Guam. “We have been growing by leaps and bounds and expanding beyond what we ever thought was possible,” Dr. Brigger says. As the program continues to grow, Dr. Brigger is extremely proud of the success they have achieved to date and the passion with which the team tackles the toughest cases. “Our outcomes speak for themselves. We’ve been able to
with kids who were told they weren’t going to get feeding tubes taken out or who were told they wouldn’t get better,” he continues. “We have accountability as a group to hold ourselves to a higher standard. We have very lively discussions among the specialties. That healthy discourse is what parents want. As a parent, I want people to push for my children. That’s why I push for these kids.”
issues that require the in-depth knowledge of
different subspecialities. My passion is airway surgery, but if the child can’t feed or talk, they need other specialists. I can fix the plumbing, and then other experts can help with the feeding or speaking.” In the past six years, the center has treated 1,200 patients. Dr. Brigger sees infants whose defects were diagnosed in utero, and toddlers whose feeding or breathing issues have worsened as they age. Referrals come from a variety of specialties, and patients come to Rady
For more information, visit rchsd.org/programs-services/ aerodigestive-center.
meet the bar,” he says. “We are aggressive—or
progressive—in the way we look at children and what we can and cannot do for their problems. We work very closely with families that are motivated. We are working
RIGHT: Matthew Brigger, MD, chief of the Division of Otolaryngology at Rady Children’s
SUMMER 2023 HEALTHY KIDS MAGAZINE 19
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