Dawn Underwood had a Mother’s Day last year unlike any most mothers have ever had to experience.
On May 8, 2011, her daughter, Greer, a fourth-grader at McBride Elementary in Muscle Shoals, received a heart transplant from a young boy in Indiana who died after being in a car accident.
“That’s what everyone kept telling me, ‘you got a great mother’s day present,’ ” Underwood said. “But when your child is back there and she’s undergoing a major surgery, you know it’s a lifesaving thing, but it’s hard at the time to think of it as a great thing.”
Dawn initially noticed her daughter was feeling sick one night at their church, Highland Park Baptist in Muscle Shoals, on Feb. 20, 2011. The pediatrician she initially saw diagnosed her symptoms — a dry cough, fatigue and shortness of breath, with sinusitis — as a sinus infection. The Underwoods didn’t see any improvement and when they later took her to the emergency room, she was diagnosed with pneumonia. Her symptoms continued to get worse, and that is when they decided to request Greer be moved.
Staff from Children’s Hospital came and got Greer and transported her to Birmingham on Feb. 26, just a few days after her initial symptoms. At Children’s, she was diagnosed with cardiomyopathy.
Read more: http://www.timesdaily.com/stories/Home-heart,190489
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