Boy manages his own hemophilia

Beau Atkinson loves telling jokes, making his friends and family laugh, and pulling pranks. Hemophilia, though, is something he takes very seriously.

When Beau was just 6 months old, his parents, Kari and Craig, started noticing unusual bruising on Beau's body, so they took him to their pediatrician.

'He had a bruise under his arm that was 2 to 3 inches long and about an inch thick, and it was hard as a rock,” Kari said. 'He had pea-sized bruises on the back of his head and what looked like fingerprints under his arms from people picking him up.”

The Atkinsons couldn't recall Beau having any injuries, so the bruises were concerning. Their pediatrician suspected that Beau had hemophilia and referred them to University of Iowa Children's Hospital to consult with a pediatric hematologist.

Beau was diagnosed with hemophilia, a rare disorder in which the blood doesn't clot normally. Rather than bleeding externally, Beau would bleed internally, which led to bruising. Craig and Kari also learned Beau had the most severe hemophilia diagnosis.

'One of the great things that the University of Iowa Children's Hospital offers is a summer camp for kids with hemophilia. During summer camp, Beau is with trained doctors and nurses and they actually teach the kids to become independent and what we call self-infused,” Kari says. 'My son starts his own I.V. every single day, and he's been doing that since he was about 8 years old.”

Today, 13-year-old Beau knows what activities to avoid and when he needs to be treated. His bleeds aren't coming as often as when he was younger, and he knows what to do when they do occur. Beau loves World War II history and hopes to be a pilot someday.