
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 24, 1990                   TAG: 9003242510
SECTION: VIRGINIA                    PAGE: A3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: CHARLES HITE MEDICAL WRITER
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

INFANT SUFFERING RARE BONE DISEASE DIES

Andy Moore, a 6-month-old Roanoke infant afflicted with a rare bone disease, died at a North Carolina hospital Friday.

Andy had been undergoing treatment with an experimental drug for several weeks when his condition deteriorated suddenly this week, officials at Bowman Gray/North Carolina Baptist Medical Center said.

Sue Argabright, Andy's mother, said her son died in her arms. After doctors told her that Andy's condition was hopeless, Argabright said, she asked that he be disconnected from the breathing machine he had had been using since Tuesday. She then took him for a final walk down a hall outside the pediatric intensive care unit.

"Everything started shutting down," Argabright said in a telephone interview from Winston-Salem. Doctors "told me there was nothing more they could do."

Andy's heart stopped beating Tuesday and he had to be revived with cardiopulmonary resuscitation.

Andy suffered from osteopetrosis, a rare and usually fatal bone disease that prevented his body from breaking down and re-forming bone. The illness left Andy blind and hard of hearing. His mental development was slow and he was physically undeveloped, weighing only 10 pounds, 8 ounces.

Doctors said a bone marrow transplant was Andy's best chance to live. They began a search for a donor and told Argabright, who had no medical insurance, to begin raising money. The transplant could cost as much at $180,000, they said.

Medicaid - the government health insurance program for the poor and disabled - is expected to cover much of the hospital bills. Medicaid would not have paid for a bone marrow transplant.

by CNB