When Taylor was born, as you can imagine, Apert Syndrome were two words we'd never heard. My beautiful son looked different and we weren't sure if he'd make it through the night (let alone lead a productive full life). His First surgery was performed by a craniofacial team headed by Dr. Henry Kawamoto MD, DDS, FACS. We would later find out that Dr. Kawamoto trained during his Craniofacial fellowship with a French surgeon, Dr. Paul Tessier, who pioneered the art of craniofacial surgery. After the 12 hour reconstructive procedure, Taylor's skull had been "rebuilt" using some of the newer techniques in medicine. He looked very different and we thought that, for
the most part, we were done. However, this was only the first step in a lifelong process of surgeries and recovery for our little boy. After some research, we discovered that there are varying degrees of Apert Syndrome, and Taylor was kind of in the middle. Some craniofacial Teams had different ways and techniques for rebuilding the skull and separating the fingers (syndactly). Luckily we lived only three hours from two of the leading craniofacial teams in the country and although he began with the UCLA Craniofacial Center, we ultimately chose to make Children's Hospital Of Los Angeles (CHLA) our home base for the rest of his procedures. Throughout the last seven years, trips to Los Angeles and Hollywood, CA have become routine. (Click here to continue the story)
