Louisa

Age 3 Michigan

Meet Louisa. 

She loves playing on the swingset and going for wagon rides with her brother, reading stories, playing games, listening to music, and everything other kids her age like to do!

Louisa has Hypoplastic Left Heart Syndrome (missing 2 chambers of heart), tracheomalsia, and gaestroparesis. She is awaiting a 3rd stage heart surgery, had a tracheotomy, and is fully tube fed. She uses a pediatric medical walker to help her get around.

Before Louisa was born, her parents knew she would need open heart surgery at just days old, and that if she survived she'd need another surgery at 4-6 months, and yet another at 2-3 years old. They didn't know she'd need a trach and be ventilator dependent for the first 2.5 years of her life.

Louisa's mom says that someday, Louisa will likely need a heart transplant.

"ALL of these conditions and the necessary medications and medical supplies are beyond what both my husband and I can ever earn and save. It is our fear that an insurance company could tell us she is not insurable, or has met a maximum.

If pre-existing conditions weren’t covered, our children would die. If you allow insurers to have a limit for lifetime, our babies would have hit it at 6 months old.”

Read more about Louisa and her family's journey here.

Submitted by Andrea Pietrowsky, Louisa’s mother