8-month-old girl battles meningitis

Kingsley Edwards is fighting back against streptococcus pneumoniae meningitis at Riley Hospital for Children. It is excruciating for her mom, Ashlyn, to see her 8-month-old baby girl this way.

Ashlyn brought Kingsley to Riley's emergency room on January 6 and the baby was quickly transferred to the pediatric intensive care unit (PICU).

"She wasn't turning her head, she wasn't tracking, she was very lethargic, she couldn't stay awake," Ashlyn explained. "We went into the ED and they were like, 'We need to go, after we get her stable, to the PICU.'"

Ashlyn said in just 48 hours, Kingsley was intubated. Dr. Courtney Rowan, a critical care physician, said Kingsley initially came to Riley's PICU while experiencing septic shock. Dr. Rowan said the team was concerned right away that it was meningitis.

"We found out pretty quickly that the bacteria that was causing her problems was strep pneumoniae," Dr. Rowan said. "Streptococcus pneumoniae is a very common infection and it's one of the types of infections that you vaccinate against in your baby vaccine schedule."

Dr. Rowan said the bacteria entered into her blood stream and made her extremely sick.

"It got into her cerebral spinal fluid which is the fluid that surrounds our brain and spine, and that's what caused her to have meningitis," Dr. Rowan explained.

Ashlyn explained that Kingsley was already vaccinated against the bacteria that can cause meningitis. But doctors explain the vaccine against streptococcus pneumoniae does not cover every strand.

"The types that are included in the vaccines are covering 95 percent of the invasive strains that are out there in the community," Dr. John Christenson, an infectious disease doctor at Riley, said. "So, we're preventing the majority of the infections that are included in these vaccines. What you're going to see in the near future is these current types that are not included in future vaccines."

Dr. Christenson said the best way to prevent this type of meningitis is to vaccinate your child.

"Just because the vaccine did not appear to have protected a child this time, a future vaccine may, but at the same time, we need to look at the infant to be sure that their immune system is completely normal, that the vaccines will work and we'll only find that out later on."

Dr. Rowan said that unfortunately when a person gets meningitis with this bacteria and becomes very sick, it is common to suffer brain injury from the meningitis.

"Kingsley, on her MRI, has shown that she has had several mini strokes across her brain," Dr. Rowan said. "She was quite sick when she came in. She had a bunch of seizures that we worked hard to control."

Fortunately, Kingsley was able to get her breathing tube removed and is able to move all of her extremities.

"Overall long term prognosis is guarded and challenging to tell," Dr. Rowan explained. "When you have this kind of degree of injury we really worry that the baby you had before this happened, won't be the baby you have after."

But Dr. Rowan and Ashlyn are hopeful for Kingsley's future.

"Children, especially infants, have a lot of ability to grow new connections [and] recover better than any adult patient would ever have the opportunity to recover," Dr. Rowan explained.

Dr. Rowan acknowledged Kingsley's family worked as fast as they could to get Kingsley the care she needed.

"It's nothing they did," Dr. Rowan said. "They couldn't have gotten her faster. The unfortunate piece with kids is they're fine until they're not, and by the time they're not, they're really sick."

Ashlyn understands Kingsley will be a patient for the long haul.

"We do know that she'll be a Riley kiddo for a while and they'll follow her as she grows," Ashlyn said.