Cleveland Clinic??

Friday was an amazing day! After watching that video and reading the stories about the man in a minimally consious state who was helped by Dr. Ali Rezai at the Cleveland Clinic, I began my search to get in touch with him. I was able to leave my name with the Research Department and thought it would probably be months before they contacted me. I knew they would be overwhelmed with calls. Luckily, I also emailed the neuro department. Amazingly, I received a phone call from his assistant on Friday. She asked me numerous questions and at the end of the conversation she said, "Well, Jess made it through Round 2". We are still very much in the preliminary phase but they are sending me a packet of information and forms to fill out. They are only accepting 11 more candidates. They will need a lot of medical history but if they feel he meets the criteria we will go to Cleveland for an evaluation. Mom and I hugged and cried and thought...maybe we will get a miracle. The family has been discussing if he did get accepted how we all feel about it. We will just have to see if we make it through Round 3.

Not long after that phone call, I got another call from the Elks Rehab in Boise. After a half an hour of questions, the social worker said he thought they could get Jess in for an evaluation with their team of outpatient therapists within the next couple of weeks. They will be able to let us know if we are on the right track with all of our therapies.

I also came up with a great idea to have Curtie, Jess' best friend come over one hour a day and work with Jess on the computer. He is very smart and knowledgeable with computers and he and Jess have been friends forever. He met with Tracy, our speech therapist, and they worked out a plan for a daily session with Jess to work on a special program called Boardmaker. Curtie sets up a way for Jess to hit a switch to scan through options of things he would like to do. He not only can see the option but he also hears what choices he can make. It's a great way to stimulate his processing and also gives him a way to talk back. With practice I think Curtie is going to make a huge difference. Thanks Curt!

So, after a few weeks of frustration and dead ends all of a sudden we have some wonderful options. I did say, I would have good news soon...you put it out there, set the motion and look what happens. My concentration for the last month has been "where or what do we do next" to the powers above. Why don't I remember...you just have to ask!