Thanks to you, many families like Liliana’s are able to get the critical care they need.
Command Pilot Brock Boscovich flying baby Liliana in stroller and her mother home to Lovelock, NV from treatment at UCSF in San Francisco for serious congenital health challenges. Her five other children and husband are there for the send off.
The doctors told Jerri that her baby, Liliana, showed multiple problems in utero. They told her that many parents-to-be in this situation choose to end the pregnancy. Jerrie told her doctors that “whatever you have to do, do it. I want my baby to have a chance in life.”
Liliana was born with a host of challenges: spina bifida, scoliosis, and congenital diaphragmatic hernia (CDH) – a hole in the muscle in the chest. She is one year old and already has had two eight-hour surgeries.
Jerrie and her husband have six children. The oldest three girls are 11, 10, and nine and help the two youngest who are seven and five while Jerrie focuses on the needs of Liliana. Her husband is the sole breadwinner. When Jerrie found out that Liliana would need special care, she said, “I didn’t want my husband or my children to carry the stress of Liliana. I always try to carry happiness and tell them everything is ok.”
Living in Reno, Nev, Liliana’s doctors were not equipped to handle all of her health challenges, and referred the family to the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) Medical Center. There she found AFW from their social worker. Before AFW, Jerrie and her husband drove from Reno over the Donner Pass to UCSF, where Liliana was born. AFW relieves the worry of travel, especially over the pass when it is snowing, which saves the family travel time, cost, and the worry that car failure or weather conditions might leave them stranded.
Jerrie says their pilot Brock was “such a gentleman. He was amazing and the nicest man I’ve ever met in my life! Brock said if Liliana gets fussy we can go back down. He made sure we were ok, always checking on us during the flight. The Reno airport is one-and-a-half-hours away and he even flew into the Lovelock airport right near us! We’re a small town, and people here were amazed that anyone would help like that. I told my kids that Liliana is a celebrity.”
Pilot Brock Boscovich, who flew the family, says, “This was my first Angel Flight mission. Though I have been a member for a few years, my busy schedule has prohibited me from flying the missions. Having the opportunity to help families like this, who have endured so much hardship, really fills me with gratitude, and I hope to fly many more missions in the near future. If we can make the lives of these people just a little bit easier or a little bit brighter, I think it makes a huge difference.”
