4-year-old Olya Turanska is quiet, but she will draw you in with her charming smile.
She's usually playing with her brothers, but for now she is thousands of miles away from them, awaiting surgery to fix a problem that appeared just after she was born.
Through a translator, her mother Ira told us, "She started spiking a very high fever.She was sick, she was crying a lot."
The fever was from an infection caused by deformities in her kidney and urinary tract.
It's easy to fix in the U-S, but not in Ukraine.
So unfortunately Olya kept getting sick, and it could get worse
Dr. Gregory Dean, of Urology for Children in Voorhees, New Jersey told us, "With each recurrent infection, you're going to get the potential for scarring, and loss of function overall."
Without surgery, Olya was headed for dialysis, until Dr. Zenia Chernyk of the Ukrainian Federation, and Dr. Gregory Dean, a pediatric urologist, stepped in.
Dr. Chernyk helped bring Olya and her mother here, Dr. Dean is donating his surgical skills, and Virtua Voorhees hospital is donating its services.
Mike Kotzen, the hospital's C-O-O, told us, "We're contributing her hospital stay, her surgical time, really, the professional and technical component, in addition to the physicians that are graciously giving their time & service to the lovely little girl."
When Olya goes home in a few weeks, Ukrainian doctors will handle her follow-up care.
Her mother is relieved to see her daughter has a healthier future.
Through the translator, she said, "She never thought she would have opportunity to make her child better."
Dr. Chernyk says Olya's problem could be linked to the 1986 Chernobyl nuclear disaster. Children exposed to radiation then are now grown up, having kids, and could be passing along damaged DNA. But Olya is expected to to have a speedy recovery.
