Grossman Burn Centers News
Teen hopes to be home for his 20th birthday
07.10.11
Derek Thomas is a burn survivor. Not a burn victim.
The wording is important. Derek’s chances of living after a horrific car crash were less than 1 percent. But after 42 surgeries, he expects to soon leave the burn center in Los Angeles where he has been for nearly a year. He hopes to make it home to Encinitas before his 20th birthday on July 30.
"I’m looking forward to it so much," Thomas said. "Coming back home and visiting the places I’ve been to. The Mexican food in San Diego is amazing."
On Aug. 9, Derek was one of five people in a Ford SUV that crashed near Bishop. The recent Cathedral Catholic High School graduate, a football player, track and rugby star and extreme athlete bound for Occidental College was burned over more than 85 percent of his body. Three others in the SUV, including his girlfriend, Amanda Post, were killed or later died of their injuries, as did a fourth person in another vehicle.
The only parts of Derek’s body that did not suffer third-degree burns were the top of his thighs, the soles of his feet and a small part of his scalp.
For the past11 months, Dr. Peter Grossman of the Grossman Burn Center in West Hills has been removing segments of Derek’s healthy thigh skin, stretching it with a machine, then grafting it onto parts of Derek’s abused body. Then the doctor waits for the thigh skin to grow back, then cuts and grafts again. And again.
"Derek is a remarkable young man," Grossman said.
Derek was kept in a medically induced coma the first four months after the accident to spare him the excruciating pain. He has been heavily medicated ever since awaking.
The night of the accident, Derek’s parents, Randy and Paula, and his two sisters, Sabrina and Kayleen, received a phone call that has defined their lives since.
They knew only that Derek was badly hurt and that others had died.
"We took off north even before we even knew where Derek was going. We just knew he wasn’t going to San Diego," Randy Thomas said. "We just drove on blind faith heading north. Just before we hit the 5/405 split we found out he was coming into West Hills, and we were just able to stay on the 405. We kept saying the rosary all the way up."
Original article: SignOnSandiego.com « Back to News