She is a beautiful little girl, with big eyes, long eyelashes and a fair face.
She is also an unfortunate little girl, suffering from tuberculous meningitis and staying in the intensive care unit for two months; what's worse, her parents haven't come to see her for a long time.
Her name is Tian Tian, 28 months old, a young patient in the tuberculosis ward of Hangzhou Red Cross Hospital.
On July 28, a comatose child came to the hospital.
Mao Minjie is the director of the ICU (Intensive Care Unit) in the tuberculosis ward of Hangzhou Red Cross Hospital. When talking about Tian Tian, he sighed before even speaking.
The child was admitted to the emergency department on July 28, accompanied by her father and maternal grandfather.
"She was only 26 months old when she came here, and her condition was already very serious: convulsions, coma, high fever nearly reaching 40℃." After diagnosis, the child was found to have tuberculous meningitis, with hydrocephalus and liver dysfunction. After adopting treatment methods such as anti-tuberculosis and liver protection, her condition gradually stabilized after a few days.
It was around this time that the doctors and nurses noticed that Tian Tian's family hadn't shown up for several days. "Around early August, we noticed her father hadn't come for several days. The nurses looked up the admission registration information and called according to the contact number, but either it couldn't get through or no one answered."
Since then, Tian Tian's parents have never come again. The nurses said that they were a young couple. The father's surname is Fan, and he is from Anhui Province, having worked in Yunnan and Inner Mongolia. Both are only 20 years old, and Tian Tian's mother is pregnant again, with a large belly.
Now, Tian Tian's vital signs are stable, but she still has occasional high fevers and convulsions, and her consciousness is not very clear. She cries when she is uncomfortable, usually remains in a semi-coma. She likes it when the nurses pick her up, and her face shows a rare expression of calmness and enjoyment, although her whole body lacks strength, and the nurses need to pay special attention to supporting her neck.
For two months, the hospital hasn't stopped treating Tian Tian.
"Besides rice soup, she can't take any other liquid food because if she eats now, it is very easy to aspirate, which could cause food to enter the respiratory tract, enter the lungs, and lead to infection. That would be very dangerous; and rice soup has too low nutritional content, so she can only drink milk powder, drinking 1600~1800 milliliters per day."
The milk powder that Tian Tian's parents brought to the hospital has long been finished. For the past two months, the doctors and nurses have pooled their money to buy milk powder, clothes, diapers... Other patients' families, seeing how pitiful the child is, have also helped out here and there. "When Tian Tian was first hospitalized, the beds were very tight. She was quite tall and couldn't fit in the small bed, so one nurse from our hospital specially brought a children's bed from home."
Checking the fee statement, Tian Tian's medical expenses since being hospitalized have amounted to more than 45,000 yuan, excluding the initial 18,000 yuan paid by the parents, leaving a balance of over 27,000 yuan owed.
"The hospital will continue to treat her. But what the child needs most right now is the concern of her parents. If her parents take care of her and hold her, it will provide her with enormous psychological comfort, and she will definitely recover faster," said Mao Minjie.
The reporter contacted the child's mother, who said: I don't make the decisions, there's really nothing I can do.
At the time of Tian Tian's admission, her parents left two mobile phone numbers. At 3:50 PM yesterday afternoon, the reporter dialed these two numbers. 136... It had been disconnected; 152... It went through! A female voice answered!
"Are you Tian Tian's mother?" The call was cut off.
The second time the call was made, she didn't avoid it anymore, admitting that she was indeed Tian Tian's mother. Without asking who the caller was, she hastily asked: "How is my daughter now?"
Then there was the following conversation (the reporter is abbreviated as J, Tian Tian's mother as H).
J: You haven't seen your daughter for a long time, right?
H: It's been a long time. (Choking voice) How is my daughter now? Is she okay?
J: The child is fine. Where is Tian Tian's father?
H: He went to Xinjiang, and we argued a lot about this.
J: Where are you? Are you still in Hangzhou?
H: I am in Hangzhou... Is my daughter really doing well? Can she be cured?
J: Her current situation is much better than when she was first hospitalized. What are your plans? To leave her in the hospital without caring for her?
H: Tell me first if she is cured?
J: What are your plans? To come and pick her up if she is cured, and abandon her if she isn't?
H: I can't help it, I don't make the decisions!
J: I heard you're going to give birth soon.
H: Yes, I'm six or seven months pregnant.
J: Are you giving up on this daughter because you're going to have another child?
H: Don't ask me, I don't know... Is my daughter better than before? Has she woken up?
J: You can go to the hospital yourself to see her!
H: I... I live with my sister. I don't work. I don't have money... There's really nothing I can do, I really don't have money...
J: Or you can tell me your husband's current phone number, and I'll talk to him, persuade him.
After a suppressed sobbing sound, the call was hung up. Calling again, the phone was turned off.