Tiny but Tough

NORTHRIDGE —  Just over a month after flesh-eating bacteria ravaged the right side of her tiny body, Baby Rosa celebrated her first birthday Friday with squeals of delight.

The party at Northridge Hospital Medical Center had the usual balloons, cake, punch and plenty of presents from the doctors and nurses who treated the Oxnard infant as she battled the deadly bacteria. But the greatest gift could not be wrapped.

Baby Rosa’s freedom.

Dressed in a red velvet Winnie the Pooh jumper, Rosa Olvera bobbed and giggled almost oblivious to the miraculous recovery she had made from the rare flesh-eating bacteria known as necrotizing fasciitis. In the past month, she endured two grueling operations in which skin grafts were taken from her buttocks to cover the gaping wound left by bacteria. At the hospital party and press conference, Rosa showed little sign of her past suffering, save for some tender pink skin peeking from her diaper.

Instead, it was her mother who still felt pain. Overcome with emotion by her daughter’s near-death experience, Rosa Suarez explained what it felt like to be taking her baby home.

As she cradled Rosa, tears fell.

“It’s incredible to be holding her,” she said, “because remembering her the way she was . . . that she hardly had a chance for survival and knowing that I have her with me now . . . She’s everything to me.”

Dr. Hooshang Semnani, head of pediatric critical care at Northridge hospital, said Rosa was close to death when she was admitted July 3 and had been given only a 50% chance of survival. The infection, said Semnani, began under her right arm and spread to her back and right side of her chest, destroying 20% of her skin.

“She really amazed everybody” by recovering, said Semnani.

Dr. Stephen Bresnick, the plastic surgeon leading the surgical team, said two operations had been performed. First, a square foot of cadaver skin had been applied over the wound. Two weeks later, the cadaver skin was replaced with grafts of Rosa’s own skin from her buttocks.

“The parents decided on the buttocks because that area can be hidden nicely, even in a bathing suit,” said Bresnick.

Although recovery is complete, Rosa must undergo physical therapy and a series of reconstructive surgeries.

In six months, Bresnick said he will insert balloons underneath her skin grafts which will be inflated periodically with saline solution. This procedure will stretch the new skin and minimize the risk of deforming her breast as she grows older.

Little Rosa first became sick on June 29 and was seen by three doctors, including one in Tijuana, before the bacteria was diagnosed during a second visit to Ventura County Medical Center. The state Department of Health is reviewing the case to determine whether she received proper care on her initial visit there.

Before the baby and her family returned to their Oxnard home Friday, they stopped at Our Lady of Guadalupe Church, where the parents had often stopped to pray after visiting her in the hospital, to give thanks for her improvement.

Afterward, the family gathered in the garage, eating tortillas, drinking sodas and polishing off what remained of the cranberry birthday cake.

Rosa Suarez held the baby in her arms as she had done for weeks at the hospital between treatments.

One family friend brought the child a beautiful frilly dress with heart patterns, but it hardly caught her attention. She was too busy making up for the eating she had missed while undergoing her extensive treatments, sucking up a cup of chicken noodle soup with relish.

“She just ate two bowls of soup,” said Elva Suarez, the baby’s great-grandmother, as Rosa dipped her fingers into the cake’s frosting. “She was never, ever sick before this. She has always been a strong, hungry child.”

Family members then surfed for a good song on a small transistor radio, hoping to entice little Rosa to dance. The baby flashed a devilish smile as she began to sway to the music.

“Let’s not talk about hospitals any more,” said Maria Suarez, the baby’s grandmother. “Let’s talk about being home.”