'Untreated' UTI puts PA collegiate athlete in coma

Pittsburgh (WPXI) — A Pittsburgh teenager is fighting for her life after she became seriously ill and wound up in a medically induced coma, and doctors say it’s all due to a urinary tract infection that went untreated.

The girl’s parents say they are relieved that there are finally signs of progress.

“She’s a perfectly healthy 18-year-old who, on Sunday, was fighting for her life,” her mother said.

Most people know Katie Sullivan as a Central Valley high school graduate, a gymnast, and a freshman softball player at Waynesburg University.

“This has been incredibly scary. Katie is not one to complain about much because she’s very athletic in two sports,” her father added.

For the last month, she had lower back pain that she thought was from her rigorous training schedule.

Just days after Christmas, she was flown to Allegheny General Hospital, in critical condition, with extremely low blood pressure and a high heart rate.

Doctors discovered that she had a urinary tract infection.

“When they did the testing, they found she had a urinary tract infection for about a month that actually caused a hole in her kidney, which caused an abscess in her liver into her back muscle and behind her kidney, and she was in septic shock,” her mother said.

For the last week and a half, she’s been in surgeries, in a medically induced coma, on a ventilator and had brain swelling.

“We weren’t given much hope. So, we brought all our family in. And hour to hour we went out and celebrated that she didn’t deteriorate.”

But everything changed Wednesday afternoon.

“For the first time, I asked her if she wanted to go home, and she shook her head yes. And they asked her if she was in pain, and she shook her head no. I asked her if she wanted to go home, and she had to put a thumbs up and she did. From not moving on Sunday and telling us hour by hour, today is miraculous.”

Doctors believe she has a long road ahead, but her parents are hoping to eventually see her back in her softball uniform.

Their one warning to everyone, don’t ignore back pain.

“Even if you think it’s nothing, please get it checked. Because I never in a million years, and I’m a nurse practitioner, did I think I’d be here watching my daughter being intubated, in renal failure, and being given a dire diagnosis at 18.”

According to the Mayo Clinic, most urinary tract infections can be treated with oral antibiotics.

Severe infections can require hospitalization and treatment with IV antibiotics.

In many cases, UTIs do not cause obvious symptoms, although the back pain that Katie Sullivan had can be a common one.

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