About a year ago, Ella Casano – now 13 – was just getting started with a plan to create a teddy bear cover to cheer up other kids who need regular intravenous infusions.
The sweet-faced stuffed bear conceals the IV bag of medicine that hangs suspended while a patient receives an infusion. At 7, Casano was diagnosed with the rare disease idiopathic thrombocytopenic purpura (ITP) and still requires regular infusions every eight weeks. At 12, she drew up prototype sketches for Medi Teddy and went to work, even creating a business plan. She said the goal was to make this medical treatment less intimidating.
Casano’s GoFundMe campaign succeeded and the Medi Teddy now has arrived in 24 countries and 47 U.S. states, according to a recent TODAY Show feature.
Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, Casano broadened the recipients to include adults as well as children because so many infusion patients needed to isolate to avoid infection.
Learn more about the project at https://www.medi-teddy.org/.
