Haley is a sweet little girl from the southern part of our country who had a big problem: for more than a month, following a dental procedure, she had been unable to eat or drink anything, since she was unable to swallow. Her fear of choking was preventing her from doing so.

Haley’s parents (as is typical in cases of food phobia, as we at Kartini Clinic refer to the intense fear of swallowing) had taken her to see her pediatrician and multiple specialists. She was unable to take even the smallest amounts of fluids and entirely unable to swallow her own saliva, something we see in severe cases. Very young children do not tolerate this inability to take in calories and water for long; she began to lose weight. Haley was seen in the emergency room near her home for i.v. re-hydration and over the course of the next few weeks was hospitalized twice. She had a head and neck CT scan, was seen by an ear, nose and throat surgeon, a gastro-enterologist, many hospital doctors and a psychiatrist. The list of tests performed was a long one. Imagine how frightening for a little girl!

In early September Haley’s family found their way to Kartini Clinic’s Food Phobia program.

As Haley’s symptoms were quite severe, we needed a few weeks for our food phobia protocol to “work its magic.” Her parents stayed with her the entire time, fighting down how frightened and desperate they had become.

I now ask you to watch this short clip (our apologies for the quality, but we are not professional film producers!) and share our triumph. Haley can “bite, chew, swallow” and is eating normally. Our whole team is filled with gratitude at this outcome.

If you know of someone who might benefit from this information, please take a moment to forward it to them. Our intake coordinator can be reached at 503 249 8851 and would be happy to discuss the program in more detail and answer any questions you may have.