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Two-Year-Old Girl Hospitalized With RSV

By Kelli Grant

SIOUX FALLS,SD - RSV is a respiratory disease nearly every child will have experienced by the time they're three years old. But that experience can vary greatly as some cases become more severe.

Two-year-old Lacie Weber has been in the hospital for six days, gradually getting better. But a tight cough is what sent her here. That cough hasn't gone away just yet and low oxygen levels are keeping her in the hospital.

"When she falls asleep, her oxygen level drops so we have to put her on oxygen," Lacie's grandma Betty Weber said.

Weber says it started as a small cold and feeling under the weather. They never thought it would send the two-year-old to the hospital.

"Basically if they do good, not everybody has to be in the hospital, but once they have trouble breathing, stuff like that, you need to get them in," said Weber.

RSV is one of the cold viruses floating around right now and doctors have been treating more cases like Lacie's this year.

"We used to have our peak of RSV in March, April. This year, we have been very busy since late December," Sanford Pediatric Hospitalist Dr. Yamen Smadi said.

Smadi says we all get RSV, but the virus can cause young children to get very sick.

"It could be just a cold and it could be very severe that they need to be in the ICU," Smadi said.

Luckily, Lacie never had to move to the Pediatric Intensive Care Unit and Smadi says compared to the number of children diagnosed every year, very few end up here.

His advice to keep little ones at home resonates with Lacie's grandma.

"If you have little kids, don't take them anywhere they don't have to be. Don't take them out just to take them out," Weber said.

Lacie's oxygen levels continue to improve, so they're hoping she'll get to go home very soon.

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