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An Angel for Our Angels, Volume 8

"Because of Dr. Campbell, Owen is alive and thriving and able to experience so much in life! Thank you Dr. C for giving our Owen a chance! We will miss you greatly! You have truly touched so many lives!"
-Owen Theriot 


"It has taken me all day to put my thoughts onto paper. In 2002, Sarah’s medical file was taken to San Antonio to be looked at by Dr. Campbell. We were then sent to Pittsburgh for Sarah to be evaluated by Dr. Moreland. Sarah was accepted into the VEPTR program and our journey started. 

My daughter was not supposed to live past 2. She will be 18 in September. How do you put into words how grateful you are to the man that invented a device and procedures that saved your daughter's life? It is quite impossible to tell him just how much he meant to our family. The kindness, compassion, and the love he showed every time we saw him was outstanding! To think that he is gone just makes my heart so sad. He gave my family hope and a quality of life she never would of had. 

May God bless him and his family in their time of need. Praying for peace and comfort for his family. RIP Dr. Robert Campbell and thank you for all you have done for my daughter."
-Kimberly Amodei



"This is the story of my daughter Brianna Jones. She was born with a rare genetic disorder called Escobar syndrome. This syndrome mostly consist of muscular skeletal deformities, including deformities of the spine. Brianna was born with four of her thoracic vertebrae fused at birth, causing severe curvature of her spine and compression of her lungs due to the ribs not being able to expand on the affected side. When she was born, we were in the hospital for six months at Texas children’s and she had a 35° curve to her spine... by the time she was two years old her spine was 98°. 

The orthopedic doctor in Houston told me she would never walk and referred us to Dr. Campbell. Brianna also suffered from a diaphragmatic hernia at birth and has been ventilator dependent since birth. We came for our three day evaluation in August or September 2001 when she was just two years old as part of the FDA case study.  We were number 137. Dr. Campbell told me that he would take her downstairs and take her off her ventilator and if she had any breathing effort on her own he could help her. The results were that she did have effort on her own and he said he could help her. 


So it was under the care of Dr. Campbell and Dr. Smith that my daughter underwent her first titanium rib implant surgery... she continued surgeries every six months from the age of two to the age of 14 with only one wound infection and one device that was removed. She is now 19 years old almost and although still vent dependent her settings have been dramatically changed to the point that she can come off her ventilator for a couple hours twice a day. She still has two devices but her spine had finished growing.


Before the rib implants, she was getting chronic pneumonia from compression of the lungs by the rib cage. I truly believe in my heart that my daughter would not be where she is today and may not even be living had it not been for the dedication, love, and intelligence of Dr. Campbell.  


He wasn’t just a doctor.  He cared. He cared about every single child that he helped. I will forever be grateful to him and that he allow the Lord to work through his hands to save so many children’s lives. He will be greatly missed, but not forgotten."

-April Robertson

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