A doctor did surgery on a boy's stuffed animal. The response from other parents was sweet.

Evan Porter
01.10.17

When 9-year-old Ryan Jasen needed surgery, he wanted his best friend by his side: a stuffed Mike Wazowski of "Monsters, Inc." fame.

But while Ryan was under the knife, his surgeon, Dr. Travis Groth of the Children's Hospital of Wisconsin, noticed Mike the monster wasn't exactly in tip-top shape either. He had a noticeable tear in his side from years of following Ryan everywhere.

So once Ryan's surgery was done, Mike went under Groth's knife to get a few stitches.

Check out this picture from our operating room. After performing surgery on a young boy, Dr. Groth made the extra effort...

Posted by Children's Hospital of Wisconsin on Wednesday, December 28, 2016

Both Ryan and his stuffed animal best friend came out of the operating room as good as new.

The photo went viral after the hospital posted it to its Facebook page. Once the comments started rolling in, it became clear Groth's sweet gesture is, amazingly, a relatively common occurrence.

In fact, doctors and surgeons all over the country are learning that stuffed animal surgeries just might be the key to keeping kids calm and comfortable in the hospital.

It may be a small gesture, but it means a lot to the kids and their parents.

"When [Ryan] woke up, he saw his best buddy also kind of patched up and had bandages around him so he felt like he was on the same page with him," Tony Jasen, Ryan's father, told WTMJ Milwaukee.

Other parents like Tony eagerly took to Facebook to share their own stories of how a stuffed animal helped their child through a scary procedure.

When Holly Decker Lamb's young daughter went in for a cochlear implant, her buddy, Mr. Cat, got one too.

"When Cora came out of surgery she was happy to see that her Cat had the same bandage as she did," Lamb wrote in a Facebook message. "We then used it to tell her that she couldn’t take her bandage’s off until Mr. Cat got his off."

Mr. Cat got a bandage after cochlear implant surgery. Photo by Holly Decker Lamb, used with permission.

Dawn Marie Spencer's son was afraid of his oxygen mask. Patrick from "Spongebob Squarepants" gave him the bravery he needed.

Watching Patrick don the mask first "really calmed him down completely," wrote Spencer.

"We can never thank the staff at Children's enough for how lovingly they took care of our son and how special they made him feel."

A stuffed Patrick demonstrates how to wear an oxygen mask. Photo by Dawn Marie Spencer, used with permission.

When Tami Doyle's daughter had brain surgery, so did her Cookie Monster.

Cookie Monster had brain surgery. Photo by Tami Doyle, used with permission.

Yara Soler's daughter had surgery for her tonsils, and her purple cat joined her in recovery.

A purple cat recovers with her girl after a long procedure. Photo by Yara Soler, used with permission.

And Gina Cummings' young son braved brain surgery with Rufus the rabbit by his side.

Rufus was a brave companion during surgery. Photo by Gina Cummings, used with permission.

Hospitals and doctors offices can be frightening for many kids. Every little bit of extra comfort helps.

Whether it's fun hospital gowns or a sweet video game to make being bedridden a little more tolerable, anything that makes a hospital room more welcoming can have a powerful effect on young kids.

The doctors, nurses, and other health care workers who tend to children in their greatest time of need are already heroes, but when they go the extra mile by simply, say, wrapping some gauze around a teddy bear's head, the results are incredibly heartwarming.

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The doctor behind a revolutionary cancer test says it all started with the support of her refugee parents

As a child, Dr. Sangeeta Bhatia's parents didn't ask her what she wanted to be when she grew up. Instead, her father would ask, "Are you going to be a doctor? Are you going to be an engineer? Or are you going to be an entrepreneur?"

Little did he know that she would successfully become all three: an award-winning biomedical and mechanical engineer who performs cutting-edge medical research and has started multiple companies.

Bhatia holds an M.D. from Harvard University, an M.S. in mechanical engineering from MIT, and a PhD in biomedical engineering from MIT. Bhatia, a Wilson professor of engineering at MIT, is currently serving as director of the Marble Center for Cancer Nanomedicine, where she's working on nanotechnology targeting enzymes in cancer cells. This would allow cancer screenings to be done with a simple urine test.

Bhatia owes much of her impressive career to her family. Her parents were refugees who met in graduate school in India; in fact, she says her mom was the first woman to earn an MBA in the country. The couple immigrated to the U.S. in the 1960s, started a family, and worked hard to give their two daughters the best opportunities.

"They made enormous sacrifices to pick a town with great public schools and really push us to excel the whole way," Bhatia says. "They really believed in us, but they expected excellence. The story I like to tell about my dad is like, if you brought home a 96 on a math test, the response would be, 'What'd you get wrong?'"

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Watch Sandy Hook Promise's 'school essentials' PSA, but prepare to be gutted by it

This is not normal.

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Someday, future Americans will look back on this era of school shootings in bafflement and disbelief—not only over the fact that it happened, but over how long it took us to enact significant legislation to try to stop it.

Five people die from vaping, and the government talks about banning vaping devices. Hundreds of American children have been shot to death in their classrooms, sometimes a dozen or so at a time, and the government has done practically nothing. It's unconscionable.

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Mom shares a heartwarming photo of the school custodian comforting her autistic daughter

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For those of us who are not on the spectrum, it can be hard to perceive the world through the senses of someone with autism.

"You could think of a person with autism as having an imbalanced set of senses," Stephen Shore, assistant professor in the School of Education at Adelphi University, told Web MD.

"Some senses may be turned up too high and some turned down too low. As a result, the data that comes in tends to be distorted, and it's very hard to perceive a person's environment accurately," Shore continued.

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A funny new video nails the disturbing truth behind e-cigarettes

Truth

Don't test on animals. That's something we can all agree on, right? No one likes to think of defenseless cats, dogs, hamsters, and birds being exposed to a bunch of things that could make them sick (and the animals aren't happy about it, either). It's no wonder so many people and organizations have fought to stop it. But did you ever think that maybe brands are testing products on us too, they're just not telling us they're doing it?

I know, I know, it sounds like a conspiracy theory, but that's exactly what e-cigarette brands like JUUL (which corners the e-cigarette market) are doing in this country right now, and young people are on the frontlines of the fallout. Most people assume that the government would have looked at devices that allow people to inhale unknown chemicals into their lungs BEFORE they hit the market. You would think that someone in the government would have determined that they are safe. But nope, that hasn't happened. And vape companies are fighting to delay the government's ability to evaluate these products.

So no one really knows the long-term health effects of e-cigarette use, not even JUUL's CEO, nor are they informing the public about the potential risks. On top of that, according to the FDA, there's been a 78% increase in e-cigarette usage among high school and middle school-aged children in just the last two years, prompting the U.S. Surgeon General to officially recognize the trend as an epidemic and urge action against it.

These facts have elicited others to take action, as well.

Truth Initiative, the nonprofit best known for dropping the real facts about smoking and vaping since 2000 through its truth campaign, is now on a mission to confront e-cigarette brands like JUUL about the lack of care they've taken to inform consumers of the potential adverse side effects of their products. And they're doing it with the help of animal protesters who are tired of seeing humans treated like test subjects.

The March Against JUUL | Tested On Humans | truth www.youtube.com

"No one knows the long-term effects of JUULing so any human who uses one is being used as a lab rat," says, appropriately, Mario the Sewer Rat.

"I will never stop fighting JUUL. Or the mailman," notes Doug the Pug, the Instagram-famous dog star.

Truth, the national counter-marketing campaign for youth smoking prevention, hopes this fuzzy, squeaky, snorty animal movement arms humans with the facts about vaping and inspires them to demand transparency from JUUL and other e-cigarette companies. You can get your own fur babies involved too by sharing photos of them wearing protest gear with the hashtag #DontTestOnHumans. Here's some adorable inspo for you:

The dangerous stuff is already out there, but with knowledge on their side, young people will hopefully make the right choices and fight companies making the wrong ones. If you need more convincing, here are the serious facts.

Over the last decade, 127 e-cigarette-related seizures were reported, which prompted the FDA to launch an official investigation in April 2019. Since then, over 215 cases of a new, severe lung illness have sprung up all over the country, with six deaths to date. While scientists aren't yet sure of the root cause, the majority of victims were young adults who regularly vaped and used e-cigarettes. As such, the CDC has launched an official investigation into the potential link.

Sixteen-year-old Luka Kinard, a former frequent e-cigarette-user, is one of the many teens who experienced severe side effects. "Vaping was my biggest addiction," he told NowThis. "It lasted for about 15 months of my high school career." In 2018, Kinard was hospitalized after having a seizure. He also had severe nausea, chest pains, and difficulty breathing.

After the harrowing experience, he quit vaping, and began speaking out about his experience to help inform others and hopefully inspire them to quit and/or take action. "It shouldn't take having a seizure as a result of nicotine addiction like I had for teens to realize that these companies are taking advantage of what we don't know," Kinard said.

Teens are 16 times more likely to use e-cigarettes than adults, and four times more likely to take up traditional smoking as a result, according to truth, and yet the e-cigarette market remains virtually unregulated and untested. In fact, companies like JUUL continue to block and prevent FDA regulations, investing more than $1 million in lawyers and lobbying efforts in the last quarter alone.

Photo by Lindsay Fox/Pixabay

Consumers have a right to know what they're putting in their bodies. If everyone (and their pets) speaks up, the e-cigarette industry will have to make a change. Young people are already taking action across the country. They're hosting rallies nationwide and on October 9 as part of a National Day of Action, young people are urging their friends and classmates to "Ditch JUUL." Will you join them?

For help with quitting e-cigarettes, visit thetruth.com/quit or text DITCHJUUL to 88709 for free, anonymous resources.

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