CINCINNATI - Ivan Voloder was born curly-haired and sweet-cheeked, big brown eyes twinkling in laughter in photos cherished by his mother, Ivana.
It would take the faith of Ivana and her husband Ivitza to endure the next eight years of pain, watching their son suffer from a malady that could have been fixed in a day in Cincinnati.
Ivan was born with Hirschsprung's Disease. It's a rare disorder that affects one in 4,000 children. Missing nerve cells in his intestine meant he couldn't expel his waste normally. He'd need surgery to survive.
The Voloders left their small town in Bosnia and Herzegovina for nearby Sarajevo, where Ivan underwent the first of many surgeries. But instead of fixing the problem, an expert who's reviewed the case says surgeons made errors that left Ivan fighting for his life with severe infections.
Ivana remembers praying one night as she watched him suffer with high fever: "Please, Lord, either take him or leave him to me but help him. Help me."
The next day Ivan's fever broke. But the damage from the surgery was done. Not only would Ivan be in diapers for life, doctors told Ivana, but now he had new complications that allowed the waste to expel from multiple locations constantly and uncontrollably. He would grow up afraid of children’s taunts and adults’ pity.
Ivana's faith wouldn't break. She researched and found there was one doctor, an expert on Hirschsprung's Disease, who had developed a groundbreaking surgery to replace the defective lower intestine with the upper portion that works, oftentimes restoring normal functioning.
That doctor was Alberto Pena, Mexican-born and trained but now practicing as a pediatric surgeon at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Colorectal Center for Children.
For the Voloders, Cincinnati seemed an impossible journey away. That's when the Order of Malta stepped in.
