Newton woman fights for her life at Omaha ICU

A Newton woman with a rare neurological and developmental disorder affecting her brain is fighting for her life in the intensive care unit in Omaha. The family members of Meredith Caves, 28, have set up a GoFundMe page to help with the financial costs accrued from her being in the hospital.

Macey Caves, of Kellogg, is the sister of Meredith and has set up the page www.gofundme.com/f/retts-go-meredith. As of June 18, the page has collected $6,010 in donations, surpassing the $200 goal. Macey told Newton News her sister has Rett Syndrome.

According to the GoFundMe page, Meredith is on a ventilator after some complications in surgery to remove lesions from her liver. Meredith is unable to take a deep breath and cough. Right now her family is not sure what the next step is. Macey said her parents have not left Meredith’s side since surgery.

During the surgery, Meredith started to become unstable and lost a lot of blood, Macey later told Newton News. Surgeons were only able to remove one lesion. The plan was to have Meredith in the intensive care unit over night and then go back to laparoscopically to remove the second lesion.

However, Meredith became unstable in the intensive care unit and had to be intubated. Macey said her sister was breathing very fast, with respirations around 60 per minute. Meredith’s heart rate was in the 160s, and she had a collapsed lung that was causing problems, too.

“The breathing tube was a success,” Macey said in an email. “She was severely constipated and they had to do a lot of medications to help with that. She is also retaining fluid so they have been giving her medications to help that, too. They decided to take the breathing tube out to see how she did.”

But Meredith did not tolerate it well and doctors had to intubate her again. Meredith has been on total parenteral nutrition since she cannot eat at this time, and the health care staff are slowly starting tube feedings. The plan is to take it very slow coming off the ventilator, Macey said.

Parents Kenny and Lora Caves are living in a hotel in Omaha to be close by.

“It was been incredibly tough on all of us,” Macey said. “Meredith is very special to us all. The GoFundMe was made to help cover the cost of gas, food, hotel etc. Please continue to pray for Meredith that she can come off the breathing tube and start working towards recovery.”

There is also a public Facebook group called “Retts Go Meredith” where family members post updates on Meredith’s condition.

Contact Christopher Braunschweig at 641-792-3121 ext 6560 or at cbraunschweig@newtondailynews.com