Long Island doctors say COVID helped them diagnose a 2-year-old's brain tumor
NEW HYDE PARK, N.Y. -- Doctors on Long Island are crediting COVID with helping save a toddler's life.
They say the virus actually triggered seizures that enabled them to diagnose a brain tumor.
There is much for the Long family of East Islip to smile about following a diagnosis that's included a few tears -- a brain tumor found last year in 2-year-old William Long.
Doctors call the way it was discovered an amazing "silver lining."
"Miraculously, COVID might have saved his life," said Dr. Shaun Rodgers, of Cohen Children's Medical Center.
Two years ago, William came down with COVID. His parents brought him to Cohen Children's Medical Center with a fever and seizures.
"He started shaking, and I knew something was wrong," mother Alexandra Long said.
Doctors found a malformation in his brain. After a year of monitoring, it began grow; it was a tumor.
"Devastating ... I was terrified," father Michael Long said.
"I just remember thinking, you're going to be OK, and he is," Alexandra Long said.
He is because the fever from COVID triggered the seizure and that led to an early diagnosis of the brain tumor.
"It was going to take some kind of fever, some kind of virus to cause him to have a seizure. We were very lucky that he had it so early before it grew into other part of the brain," Rodgers said.
Not many people would call COVID lucky; the Longs, parents of four, understand that.
"COVID, it was and is horrible. We had job loss. We had similar problems that most families in this country were facing ... But we really feel extremely lucky to have found it when we did and not when he was 10 years old and maybe it had grown much bigger by then," Alexandra Long said.
A portion of William's brain -- the size of an egg -- was surgically removed, but because it was caught so early, doctors say he will have no deficits in brain function.
One side of his hippocampus, which hold memories, was removed, but the other side will make up for it.
"He's got a cool scar and he's gonna have a cool story, but luckily, no real memory of this for him, you know, just being 2-and-a-half years old," Alexandra Long said. "We count our blessings every day."
And their gratitude to doctors who saved his life.
William will be monitored for many years to make sure the tumor cells do not grow back, but doctors are hoping this was a full cure.