Photos and story by Cindy Abole, Public Relations

Jim Harrison congratulates his son on reaching another rehab milestone. Jason began using a rolling walker in late April.

Jason and MUSC homebound tutor Frank Wells review a division problem during his daily lessons. Wells was one of many caregivers who followed Jason throughout his long-term care.

In less than a year, 17-year-old Jason Harrison has already experienced more physical and mental challenges than most people face in a life-time. But he wasn’t alone in his efforts as friends, family and strangers stood by him.

A junior at the Academy of Science, Arts and Technology in North Myrtle Beach, Jason was the newly elected class president. He played on the school’s golf team, hunted and played in the summer baseball league. His steel-blue eyes have always focused on college and a bright future.

On a rainy September afternoon in 1997, Jason’s dreams for the future nearly ended. He was leaving school and driving his Pontiac Firebird north on Hwy. 17 in North Myrtle Beach when a car allegedly swerved in front of him, forcing him to hydroplane off the road towards an oncoming pickup truck.

When Jason’s father, Jim Harrison, arrived soon after at the Grand Strand Regional Medical Center, he found Jason in grave condition. Doctors didn’t expect Jason to live through the night. On the third day following the accident, his liver stopped functioning. Jason, who suffers from severe juvenile diabetes, could not be treated further at the Myrtle Beach hospital. Working quickly, Harrison’s boss, Dan McGowan of Holiday Network International Travel-American Express in Myrtle Beach, offered to fly Jason anywhere in the United States for treatment. Harrison chose MUSC in nearby Charleston for his son’s care. But bad weather intervened. Instead of being quickly transported by MUSC’s MEDUCARE fixed-wing airplane, he was carried by ambulance for the two-hour ride to Charleston. He wasn’t expected to survive the trip.

At MUSC, Jason was placed in intensive care under the supervision of Karl Byrne, M.D., associate professor of surgery in the Department of Surgery, and E. Douglas Norcross, associate professor of surgery and director of the surgery-trauma intensive care unit. He was diagnosed with closed head injuries. He was in a coma.

“We see patients like Jason come through MUSC with similar injuries all the time,” Byrne said. “It was the determination of Jason’s father, family and friends that led them to accept nothing less than a full recovery. Yet, there were certain aspects of his care— mainly his severe diabetes—that challenged his caregivers with a crisis almost on a daily basis.” That challenge began Jason’s long, seven-month-plus ordeal at MUSC.

On Oct. 7, Jason was taken to the fourth floor ICU to begin his recovery. There, he contracted the first of three bouts with a life-threatening pneumonia. While Jason still lay in a coma, lung specialist Carolyn Reed, M.D., professor of surgery and head of thoracic oncology, performed an operation that saved Jason’s left lung.

Jason showed the first signs of response from his coma on Oct. 27. He opened his eyes to the delight of doctors, nurses and family. His grandmother and constant companion, Jessie Ruth Harrison of Greenwood, fondly remembers that moment. “It gave us more hope to know that when he did open his eyes, we had a little more to hang onto. Somehow, we always knew that God would answer our prayers.”

Jason’s family—mother, Sarah Moore, and sisters, Angie, 27, and Kristi, 21, of Greenwood, plus stepmother, Patricia Harrison—continue to take turns caring for Jason. “We all pitched in,” said his grandmother.

Moving ahead in his recovery, Jason was taken Nov. 27 to the Transitional Care Unit at Charleston Memorial Hospital. Shortly after, a setback with temperature and an infection transferred Jason to the eighth floor’s Medical ICU on Dec. 3. A gaunt Jason weighed only 95 pounds on his young 6-foot, 1-inch frame. It was then that he was reintroduced to the pediatric endocrinology team of Drs. L. Lyndon Key, Stephen Willi and Carla Scott who had been following his care all along.

“The main problem was that many of the physicians had their doubts that Jason was a good candidate for intensive rehabilitation, based upon the severity of his injury,” said Key, division director of pediatric endocrinology. Jason’s long-term prognosis was based on his intracranial injury and its affect on cognitive and functional abilities.

Jason was introduced to Frank Wells, a teacher working with MUSC’s homebound program, an educational program sponsored through Charleston County Schools and designed to help Children’s Hospital patients during their stay. Although Jason couldn’t speak, the soft flicker in his eyes revealed an intelligence that was still alive. After only a few visits with Wells, Jason spelled his and his father’s names on a magnetic alphabet board. Within days, he was working basic math problems. Today, Jason’s math ability has progressed to include pre-algebra and long division, stifling any questions regarding his cognitive abilities.

In an effort to manage his diabetes, stabilize the effects of the trauma and begin rehabilitation, Key and his colleagues recommended that Jason be admitted to the Children’s Hospital on Dec. 22. “We prayed for a Christmas miracle and that’s what we got,” Harrison said.

Progressing daily, Jason was moved Feb. 17 to the MUSC Rehabilitation Unit where he is recovering today with the help of a team of caregivers. Jason’s right arm and leg developed severe spasticity—increased muscle tone which resists and limits movement—and abnormal bone growth in soft tissue. These complications prevented his right arm and leg from functioning. David Thompson, M.D., assistant professor of orthopaedic surgery, used surgery to help correct these secondary effects of his closed head injury and allow him to progress more rapidly in physical therapy.

“When Jason came to us in February, he was very limited in his abilities,” Rast said. “He was easily agitated and inconsistently responded to short simple commands. In physical therapy, we were able to initially concentrate on improving his functional abilities such as bed mobility and transferring from his bed to the wheelchair. Then his physical therapy treatment progressed to standing at the parallel bars and more recently to walking with a rolling walker.”

Jason’s speech also suffered. After the coma, he communicated by responding to yes and no answers. With the help of a Vocaide, a lap-top device featuring a vocal alphabet, Jason “talks” to the team of doctors and nurses, family members and visitors. “I’m getting better,” he spelled on the machine. He continues to work on his language skills with a speech therapist. He continues to focus on improving his function and independence daily.

“Jason’s situation exemplifies a successful medical team—combining trauma, rehabilitation, pediatric and surgery specialities—that works successfully here at MUSC,” Key said. Asked what he misses the most, Jason spells out “being with friends” on his Vocaide.

It’s not unusual to see 25-30 students visiting Jason on weekends. The day following the accident, classmates showed support by organizing a group known as “Friends of Jason.” They created flyers and T-shirts sporting the title from country singer Hank Williams Jr.’s song, “A Country Boy Can Survive.” Signs scattered throughout businesses around North Myrtle Beach displayed the get-well message: “Pray for Another Miracle for Jason.”

“I believe God healed Jason through these doctors,” Harrison said. “There was a tremendous amount of prayer going on.”

“I see myself as a dad and best friend,” Harrison said. “Jason needed an advocate and spokesman, someone to get involved in the healing process and to ask questions like ‘how much insulin are you giving him? Why is he getting this?’ I asked a ton of questions.”

“The speed of Jason’s recovery continues to surprise everyone,” Key said. “If it hadn’t been for the fact of his family ‘pushing the envelope’ and being involved in his care and recovery, it would be hard to determine where Jason would be right now. It proves that someone needs to be an advocate for a patient’s care.”

Although the road to recovery has been long, Harrison can only relay a positive message to people in similar circumstances. “If I can say anything to families, it would be to do your part. Read, search the Internet. Find out everything. We all worked together throughout the whole thing.”

“If I had this to do over again and I was standing at Grand Strand hospital three days after a car accident and they said to me where do you want to take your son. The choice would still be MUSC,” said Harrison. “I made the right choice.”

Patient tests interdisciplinary teamwork

Without knowing it, rehabilitation patient Jason Harrison has helped to prove that MUSC caregivers can integrate interdisciplinary specialties and develop a successful framework that can improve long-term patient care.

Two decades ago, about 90 percent of patients with severe head injuries died. Today, at least 50 percent survive due to improved technologies and treatments within today’s emergency-rooms, surgical and intensive-care units.

When 17-year old Jason Harrison was admitted to MUSC in fall 1997 with a severe closed head injury, his critical care teams were able to treat him with the same care and experience as with any other severe head injury victim. Yet, Jason’s case was different. Suffering from severe diabetes, Jason’s treatment and care challenged physicians, nurses and other staffers with patience and the need for continuity with his care.

“Jason was lucky to come to a large hospital center which has the ability to provide service through specialists and staff and small enough to provide the individual care he needed throughout his stay,” said L. Lyndon Key, M.D., division director of pediatric endocrinology.

There’s no question to the quality of care assembled at South Carolina’s largest medical center. In 1997, MUSC’s Medical Center was named among the country’s top 100 in a study published in Modern Healthcare. The medical center was listed by the U.S. News & World Report’s list as the best hospital in South Carolina. It ranked in 1995 and 1997 among the nation’s top 100 hospitals in seven specialities: endocrinology, gastroenterology, rheumatology, neurology, urology, cardiology and pulmonary disease.

Key, who is listed in the 1992, 1994 and 1996 edition of the “Best Doctors in America,” possesses a multitude of credentials which include post-doctoral work in pediatric endocrinology at Duke University, Harvard Medical School and Boston Children’s Hospital.

Carolyn Reed, M.D., professor of surgery and head of thoracic oncology operated on Jason’s left lung during the early stages of his care. Top-rated in her field, Reed became the first woman elected to the American Board of Thoracic Surgery in 1997.

“Jason’s case was unique mainly because of his brittle diabetes,” said Timothy Murphree, M.D., assistant professor of physical medicine and rehabilitation. “I’ve never seen a patient with such an intricate and complex care plan designed for controlling his blood sugar. It affected his mental and physical ability which required nursing and other caregivers to make extraordinary efforts.”

Murphree is board certified in physical medicine and rehabilitation. He completed his residency training in neurology at MUSC.

“We really needed continual interaction between rehabilitation, pediatric endocrinology and orthopaedics throughout the rehabilitation process,” Murphree said. He ranked the continuity of Jason’s care as one of the deciding factors to his admission into rehabilitation services.

“We helped organized team meetings to assist Jason and his family,” Key said. “Our system provides an expertise beyond care within a specialty treatment package.”

Murphree and the members of Jason’s rehabilitation team meet weekly to discuss Jason’s progress. Like pieces in a puzzle, their input is vital to his recovery efforts and a successful example of interdisciplinary care among staffs. The group consists of Val Kreil, speech pathologist; Dan Herres, social worker; Angela Thomas, resident physician; Beatrice Burch, nursing; Alice Libet, clinical psychologist; Chris Cote, occupational therapist; Kelley Rast, physical therapist; Kelly Wise, dietician; Frank Wells, tutor, and more than a dozen rehab nurses.

“Essentially, nobody gave Jason a chance,” Key said. “MUSC became the conduit for Jason to move ahead to a more meaningful rehabilitation program.”

So what does Jason’s experience tell medical specialists the next time a family has to make a decision regarding the quality of patient care at MUSC? “At least we have proved that it can be successfully pulled together,” Key said.