Who: A special medical device gave one local family extra time to spend with their infant son.
Joseph and Hannah Dinan Henselder of Tunkhannock are the parents of Myles Theodore Henselder, who lived for six minutes after his birth on Sept. 1. Twenty-two weeks into the pregnancy, the Henselders had learned their son had Type 2 thanatophoric dysplasia, a lethal form of dwarfism occurring in 1 in 20,000 to 50,000 newborns, according to the U.S. National Library of Medicine. It can result in stunted limbs and underdeveloped ribs and lungs.
Myles developed fluid on his brain and a cloverleaf-shaped head, and his lung deformity left him unable to swallow amniotic fluid. That caused his mother to develop polyhydramnios, a condition in which pregnant women have excess amniotic fluid. She ended up carrying about 40 extra pounds of fluid and needed a decompression amniocentesis.