a PDF of this story.

juliana pAVON
It takes a village
June 2, 2011: The accident details are sketchy. Eight year old Juliana
and her mother Melissa, pregnant with her second child, were traveling
on a dirt road somewhere outside of Tegucigalpa, Honduras. They
reportedly swerved to avoid a farm animal and Juliana was ejected from
the car. She survived but had catastrophic injuries to her head, face
and arms from being dragged on the road.
The next months were a painful blur as doctors worked to repair the
damage to her fragile little body. Her left eye ruptured and was
repaired. Facial paralysis on her right side made blinking impossible
and her cornea ulcerated. Other injuries required complex reconstructive surgery, but her doctors had done all they could.
Juliana was blind.
continued on back
they say it takes a village. As a
member of the dedicated team of doctors who
came together to help this remarkable, brave little
girl, I know they couldn’t be more right.”
— Dr. Debbie Jacobs
464 Hillside Avenue | Needham, MA 02494 | 781-726-7337 | www.bostonsight.org
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Juliana Pavon continued
Then in August a doctor from Shriners
Hospital for Children learned of Juliana’s
plight and flew her to Boston for specialized care. Shriners reached out to James
Chodosh, MD, Cornea Specialist at Mass
Eye and Ear to evaluate her injuries.
Juliana needed a cornea transplant to
restore vision to her right eye, but without
the ability to blink it was destined to fail.
So Dr. Chodosh called on Mass Eye and
Ear colleague and BFS Medical Director
Deborah S. Jacobs, MD; they hoped a
PROSE device could protect the delicate
ocular surface until her lid could be
repaired. Dr. Jacobs joined Dr. Chodosh
in the operating room- the surgery was a
success.
Dr. Jacobs turned to Karen Carrasquillo,
OD, PhD, to design a PROSE device with
a special ledge to elevate the eyelid.
Bilingual herself, Dr. Carrasquillo
developed a close connection with
Juliana: “Juliana just wanted to be able to
do the things most little girls lovejumping rope, playing with Barbie dolls,
going to school, laughing with friends.”
After six months away from home, Juliana
returned to Honduras on December 20th,
2011. Seeing her new baby brother’s
smile for the first time, she knew her
Christmas wish had finally come true.
Juliana’s dream was to be reunited with
her mother, father and newborn brother
Alexander in Honduras in time for Christmas. But it was already November and
her vision was still compromised- a
droopy lid was obscuring sight in her left
eye and surgery to fix it was too risky.
464 Hillside Avenue | Needham, MA 02494 | 781-726-7337 | www.bostonsight.org
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