Meghan King Edmonds' Daughter May Be Able to Help Her Baby Brother with His Brain Injury in a Huge Way
The Real Housewives of Orange County mom shared an update on the latest efforts to treat her son Hart's condition.
Meghan King Edmonds and her family have rallied around her son Hart as he seeks treatment for his brain condition. In fact, Meghan's eldest child, Aspen, who turns 3 in November, may be a huge help to her little brother.
The Real Housewives of Orange County alum shared a new update on Hart in her recent Instagram Story. "This is the next step to see if Hart can use Aspen's stem cells from her banked cord blood (I just swabbed their cheeks)," Meghan captioned a video that showed her getting ready to send off the swabs and crossing her fingers for good results.
Cord blood is the blood from the baby that is left in the umbilical cord and placenta after birth, which can be stored for later use, according to The American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists. Cord blood contains hematopoietic stem cells, which can be used to treat more than 70 types of diseases, including diseases of the immune system, genetic disorders, and neurologic disorders.
Meghan shared that Hart "has irreversible brain damage" as a result of minor Periventricular Leukomalacia in a post on her blog in July. She said this brain injury diagnosis explained all of the concerns she had about her son: "the rigidity in his muscles, the (somewhat) delayed physical milestones, the lack of fluidity with arm and leg movements, the stiffness in joints, the weakness in his lower back, the somewhat favored use of his right side." Hart's neurologist also said that he is at risk for being diagnosed with cerebral palsy and will be monitored.
Since then, Meghan has been working hard to try to alleviate her son's condition, including visiting a chiropractor to help open up his nerves to create new neuropathways and diving in a hyperbaric oxygen chamber to get more oxygen to his brain cells to help the neuropathways work and loosen his tight leg muscles.
