Former trauma patients, Cooper medical staff celebrate life

Richard Pagan ran down an Adventure Aquarium ramp to see the crocodiles. Naequan Rivera played doctor on a large teddy bear. Allysa Lesher chatted with nurses about college.

All that seemed impossible for the three South Jersey youths not so long ago. All were trauma victims whose lives were saved by quick-acting doctors and nurses at Cooper University Hospital.

Richard, Naequan, and Lesher joined nearly 20 other children and their families Saturday at Cooper Hospital's Celebrate Life event at Adventure Aquarium. It was a chance for the hospital trauma staff and the little patients they helped save to catch up over lunch and have some fun. Many hugs and pictures were also exchanged.

After all, most of the children being honored beat incredible odds.

"It's so nice to be able to see them walk again," said Brittany Spaeth, a child-life specialist at Cooper. She reconnected with several of the kids she took care of when they were in intensive care and under severe stress.

Last time she saw Nicholas Ofak Jr., he was wearing a helmet to protect his newly implanted skull and he needed help walking.

Nicholas, 11, was walking all over the aquarium, laughing and playing with other children. His parents, like many at the event, couldn't say enough good things about Spaeth and the rest of the staff.

Nicholas was injured last December when he fell off a pogo stick at school. When he started vomiting, his mother took him to a local hospital. Once doctors determined his brain was hemorrhaging, he was rushed to Cooper's trauma center.

He spent 11 days in a medically induced coma and was eventually sent home on Christmas Eve.

"We call him our Christmas miracle," Nicholas' mother, Michelle, said as she glanced at Nicholas watching the hippos.

Recalling her family's experience at Cooper, Michelle Ofak said: "It was the care only a mother could give."

Other mothers had similar praise. Some of the children spoke of wanting to go into the health-care field because of their experience at Cooper.

Allysa Lesher, 18, was on her first driving lesson when she was struck head-on two years ago by a distracted driver. She now is a freshman at Widener University in a physical-therapy program, hoping to help trauma victims recover. Both her ankles were fractured in the accident and her heart was punctured; she spent 11 days on a ventilator.

On Saturday, she was promoting the foundation she started, Just Drive, to raise awareness of the dangers of distracted driving.

Naequan Rivera and Richard Pagan were also walking miracles. The two Camden boys suffered severe brain injuries when struck by vehicles in separate accidents in the last year.

Richard, 5, who is known to almost everyone at Cooper as Captain America because of his love for the superhero, was wearing his superhero muscle T-shirt.

A ball of energy, he moved quickly from one aquarium exhibit to the next, looking for the much-anticipated sharks.

"I'm not scared," he said.

His ability to run around and have conversations is a huge improvement from the summer, when he spent three weeks in the Cooper ICU, his mother said.

Richard is back in school at H.B. Wilson Elementary in Camden and back to being his superhero self.

Just like the rest of the Cooper trauma survivors he hung out with.