We feel so blessed for all the amazing medical professionals we have in Hattie’s corner. James and I had a phone call with her genetics counselor from Baltimore to obtain this information last Friday. It was humorous only because I totally blew the timing and forgot Baltimore was on eastern time – so instead of being at home with our notepad ready….we were getting family lunch at sonic with all 3 kids awake and loud in the back ground. Our genetic testing we most recently had performed after visiting Kennedy Krieger showed a diagnosis for Hattie.
Hattie was found to have a de novo variant in a gene called GNB1. This is a rare, recently discovered disorder. Frequent characteristics include hypotonia, global developmental delay, intellectual disability, and epilepsy. There is no cure or targeted treatment for GNB1-related disorder at this time.
GNB-1 Syndrome was recently discovered in 2016 and so limited research is found about it. Hattie’s hypotonia since birth, global developmental delay (motor, speech and cognitive), Slow Growth and eye problems all fit into this diagnosis. GNB-1 would be a diagnosis under the CENTRAL (brain/genes) pathway which is different from what we originally were thinking. Now that Hattie is 20months we are seeing that she is falling behind in all areas not just with her motor development. This syndrome is highly linked to epilepsy and seizure disorders so it means that we will need to monitor her closely for any development in that area.
We traveled to Birmingham on Easter for Hattie to have an MRI under anesthesia at Childrens and then have her 6month followup with her Neurologist. The MRI of the brain showed no abnormality except for slight enlargement of 1 ventricle (which doesn’t really mean much). Her MRI of her spine showed something called a syrinx (fluid filled cyst) within her spinal cord which is small but should not be contributing to her symptoms. More than likely is linked with the genetic disorder and we will just have to continue monitoring it as she grows.
The visit with her Neurologist was pretty uneventful which was a pleasant change from our normal news.
I think back to the conversation on Friday and the question “I’ve just downloaded you all with lots of information, do you have any questions?” and laugh a bit. From our hour long conversation we basically know that we will know more in 5-10 years….
- Hattie may never develop normal speech but might could use technology to help her communicate with us.
- Hattie may never walk – the 2 children with her variant are older than her and still in wheelchairs
- Hattie will always have Hypotonia – she may get stronger but there is no way to know what that looks like
- Hattie may develop seizures
- Hattie needs yearly Blood drawn (aka CBC) because there was one child that developed Leukemia due to the Gprotein issue
- Hattie will always have Global developmental delay
Bottomline – We have a beautiful happy special needs child that we will push and fight for, pray for and love, Continue to take to her therapists as much as we can. Learn more about and Try and discover what she needs as we go.
We have cried and laughed, are grieving and praying – but at the end of the day our Hands are going up. We praise the Lord for the gifts that all our children are! We know without a doubt there is always something working for the good and that all we must do is put one foot in front of the other. So many families don’t have an answer and here we are after less than 2 years with an answer!
We will continue to keep you posted on this crazy Jetton life – P.S. I’m super pregnant and at home from work due to heart palpitations. I have a ginormous baby boy in my belly and I can’t kick him out for at least another month – preferably 6 weeks. Pray for us – especially James, he soooo needs it!