Samantha Tells Her Story

Dana Hutchinson’s daughter Samantha is a high school senior and star volleyball player at Curtis High School in University Place.  She was preparing for her club volleyball’s trip to the Junior Olympics in Miami.  

Then their lives turned upside down – Samantha woke up not feeling well-luckily her dad, Rick was off from work that day.  During the morning he could sense something wasn’t right.  He was able to make an appointment at Pediatrics Northwest- they were able to squeeze Samantha in for the last appointment of the day.

By the time of her appointment, Samantha was feeling horrible, she was lethargic and in pain, her legs were on fire.  And she had significant purple bruising and tiny pink dots on her body.

The doctor came in to see Samantha. He took one look at her and asked her if she could walk and she said no. Not wanting to waste any time he took her across the street to the Mary Bridge Emergency Department.  

He personally wheeled Samantha from his office, through the tunnel to the Mary Bridge Emergency Department (ED). Within five minutes of him stepping into the exam room- Samantha was in the ED.

Things progressed quickly once in the ED.  Samantha was immediately put on a bed and given IV’s in both arms.  The fluid was not going into her fast enough.  The nurses were squeezing the IV bags to get the fluid to go into her faster.

Samantha was in septic shock and her blood pressure was 60/25.  Her kidneys were failing. Once stabilized with fluid, the medical staff felt that her lungs were in jeopardy and would fail next.  Samantha was intubated and put on life-support and transferred to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit (PICU).

Samantha was lucky to be at Mary Bridge Children’s Hospital where the ED doctors know that a 17-year-old is different than adult patient. They knew how to treat Samantha.

Samantha spent 6 days on life-support in the PICU.  When she woke up, the staff was prepared for the worst.   Dana said, “There is nothing good about this disease… Most kids lose some appendage with this disease. The odds of Samantha awaking without a disability were slim.”  To everyone’s amazement Samantha awoke with all of her functions and she had her arms and legs, fingers and toes.  

Samantha worked hard and six days after leaving the PICU she was able to go home.  She amazed the doctors with her courage and determination to get better. Samantha was sent home, but had a long road ahead of her for a full recovery.

Just as the doctors had suspected, the diagnosis of bacterial meningococcal was confirmed.  This deadly disease can take a healthy person’s life within 10-24 hours.  Samantha had been vaccinated for this disease, but the vaccine only covers four of the five strains. Samantha got the one strain not covered. Samantha is the first child to leave Mary Bridge with a full and complete recovery from this disease.

Samantha’s survival and success story is a story about everything that needed to go right going right: Her dad knew that something wasn’t right and made that call to the doctor’s office and got the last appointment, her doctor saw the signs and symptoms and acted quickly (even though he had only seen this disease in text books), the ED doctors knew what it was and how to treat it, and the wonderful staff at Mary Bridge cared for her.  The Hutchinson family feels very blessed.  

After Samantha‘s 12 day stay at Mary Bridge she went to outpatient physical therapy. She worked hard every day with the goal to be back on the volleyball court for the fall high school season.  Samantha met that goal and more: she was named to the SPSL 1st team and the TNT All league and she led Curtis High School to a second place finish in the state volleyball tournament.  Samantha has signed a letter of intent to play volleyball for WWU in the fall 2010. She is the true hero!