Ryan suffered an asthma attack while playing soccer in school and was unable to reach his rescue medication, which was locked in the school office.
The suffering boy needed his inhaler to open his airways and allow him to breathe.
After an investigation, it became clear that Ryan’s school didn’t allow him to keep his puffer with him, despite repeated efforts by his mother and a doctor’s note.
According to his mother, Sandra Gibbons, Ryan would often bring an extra inhaler to school in order to bypass this rule.
Asthma attacks aren’t always predictable, and it is dangerous to keep the inhaler locked in a room.
But the school kept taking Ryan’s extra inhaler away.
Ryan’s mom said that the school called her on several occasions, asking her to pick up an inhaler that Ryan had brought to school.
He wasn’t allowed to bring it home.
”You would give him an inhaler but then he would get caught with the inhaler and then it would be taken away,” Sandra Gibbons said, speaking to CBC.
”Then I’d get a phone call. So it was actually very frustrating. I didn’t understand why. I didn’t realize that the policy actually stated that the prescribed medication needed to be in the office.”
Fortunately, Ryan’s tragic death was not in vain.
Since Ryan’s death, his mother has vowed to do whatever she could to prevent another family from going through what she went through.
“When Ryan passed away, it was like losing everything that I lived for,” Gibbons told Allergic Living. “After burying my son, I knew that this was a preventable attack. To me, if people had appropriate training and knew what to look for when a child was in distress, he would be here today.”
Sandra’s aimed to change the laws that keep asthmatic children from being able to carry their life-saving devices.
And soon her conscious struggle would generate results.
Known as Ryan’s Law, Bill 135 has now passed with all-party support in the legislature.
The law forces schools to allow children to have their inhalers in their pocket or backpack with a doctor’s note.
“I’m definitely overwhelmed, very emotional, very happy it’s going to be implemented,” said Sandra Gibbons.
The Asthma Society also applauded the bill’s passage, with president Dr. Rob Oliphant saying “it is essential that children with asthma have ready access to potentially life-saving asthma medications while at school.”
However, some kids are still being denied access to these lifesaving medications during the school day. Many schools ban inhalers through their blanket anti-drug policies.
Even though death rates have declined in the past decade, any asthma death is potentially preventable.
Let’s pass this article on to remember Ryan and to inform others about the risks of asthma patients not having close access to their inhaler.
