18-month-old receives life-saving 3-D printed airway implants

18-month-old Garrett Peterson of Utah received life-saving airway transplants using 3-D imaging and printing technology.

Garrett suffered from tetralogy of Fallot with absent pulmonary valve that had developed into severe tracheobronchomalacia, or softening of his trachea and bronchi, to the point that the airways had collapsed and he was living off of ventilators.

Surgeons at the University of Michigan's C.S. Mott Children's Hospital created bioresorbable splints that opened up his airway. Even more amazing, the splints are biodegradable, and will naturally and harmlessly dissolve (over three years) while the trachea and bronchi strengthen. Eventually he will be able to breathe on his own without ventilation.

About 1 in 2,200 newborns are affected with tracheobronchomalacia. Garrett's case was severe, and represents only 10 percent of most cases. Typically infants grow out of it by age 2 or 3, and sometimes affected kids can have it misdiagnosed as asthma that doesn't respond to treatment.

Glenn Green, associate professor of pediatric otolaryngology, and Scott Hollister, professor of biomedical engineering and mechanical engineering and associate professor of surgery, developed the device at the University of Michigan. Garrett is the second person to be saved with the cutting edge technology.

Garrett struggled to breathe and was in and out of hospitals since he was born. Watching helplessly while your child struggles is no easy thing, his parents note.

"It's really hard to watch your child basically suffocate and pass out before you could revive him and bring him back, over and over," Jake Peterson, Garrett's father, said in a press release.

Garrett's condition had worsened. He was in intensive care, his gut was collapsing from the ventilator pressure, and his parents at the end of their rope when they opted for the 3-D printed device.

"It was highly questionable whether or not he would survive," Green said.

Garrett will be able to return home in a few months.

"We needed to give him a chance and that's what these splints have done," said mother Natalie Peterson. "And now he'll show us what he can do."