My Why: SickKids saved Kat Scott’s daughter. Years later, she works with the same unit that supported her family

Sitting on the caregiver daybed in an inpatient room at The Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), Kat Scott watched her daughter Liv examine the space around her. It was new to Liv’s eyes, but Kat was transported back 23 years ago, when she’d slept on the same bed every night of her daughter’s hospital stay as the six-month-old recovered from open heart surgery.

“Sitting there with my adult child, it was the first time we had been back on the unit in the 23 years since her surgery, it was full circle and very surreal,” Kat says. 

The Scott family’s journey with SickKids is full-circle in another way too: in 2020, Kat joined SickKids as an HR partner — giving back to the hospital that saved her daughter nearly two decades earlier.  

A ‘leap of faith’ 

Liv was Kat and her husband James’ first child, and her early days were marked with other firsts for her parents: Kat’s first time driving in downtown Toronto, to Liv’s appointments at SickKids, and James’ first times donating blood, when he learned he was a match for Liv and could do a directed donation before her surgery.  

Just over a week after Liv was born, she was acting differently and having trouble feeding. A trip to a local hospital’s Emergency Department revealed three holes in her heart. After a week-long hospital stay Liv was referred to SickKids, where physicians confirmed her conditions: a two-millimetre atrial septal defect (ASD), a hole between the central line of her heart’s atria; a five-millimetre ventricular septal defect (VSD), a hole in the central line of her ventricles; and patent ductus arteriosus (PDA), which is when a certain artery in the heart does not close after a baby is born. 

Kat and her husband had to decide if they’d pursue surgery to repair the holes, which could close on their own but were considered significant in terms of their size. It was a lot to think about, Kat recalls, and she wanted to make sure they made an informed decision. 

“SickKids really helped with that. Everyone we met, the surgeons and everybody in the Cath lab, was so generous with their knowledge and kind with our questions,” she says.  

She’d also learned it was a relatively common surgery — but she says she was never made to feel like it wasn't a big deal. 

Although staff were “incredible teachers,” it was still scary, she says, and still felt like taking a “leap of faith.” 

That leap led the family to Liv’s surgery, exactly six months from the day she was born.

By the time of the surgery, driving and parking downtown were “old hat” for Kat. Liv’s surgery was at 8 a.m. on July 8 and Kat and family arrived two hours early for the pre-op prep. When Kat handed Liv to the surgical nurses, she and her family were in tears — but Liv, looking up at one of her nurses, was laughing “like crazy.”  

“It was beautiful to see her not scared,” Kat says.  

Liv’s surgery took around five hours, an hour longer than the family had expected. To stitch closed the VSD, the team used a piece of waterproof fabric to create the central line of her heart. After the surgery, Kat and her family got to see Liv in the Cardiac Critical Care Unit (CCCU). She was surrounded by tubes and beeping monitors, still intubated — but moving around, trying to breathe on her own. “She was strong from the start,” Kat says. 

Nurses in the CCCU showed Kat how to hold and feed Liv while the tubes were attached. She was soon transferred to the inpatient cardiology unit, 4D, where “the magic really happened.” Nurses educated Kat and her husband about how to hold and carry Liv and how to feed her. It was there that Liv learned how to sit up, looking at everything happening around her. 

It was overwhelming to be taking six-month-old Liv home just four and a half days after heart surgery, Kat says, but she and James felt confident because of the education the nurses provided.

“SickKids has a big support community for parents, including volunteers,” Kat says.

She recalls a volunteer offering to watch Liv while she got a cup of coffee, which stood out as a small moment of respite.  

Through it all, her family took lots of pictures of Liv — because, as Kat describes it, “we didn’t know if we were gonna get to keep her.” And if they did? 

“I wanted to be able to tell her her story, and show her what she went through, with some proof.” 

Growing up and giving back 

Liv says it's “surreal” to know what she went through as a baby, a time she has no memories of. From a young age, her parents were open with her about the experience and spoke positively about her scars from the chest tube and surgery.

“They were always something my parents told me made me special and made me different from other kids in a good way, because they show my strength and my bravery from when I was really young,” Liv says. 

When she was younger, her mom would help her practice saying “ASD, VSD, PDA repair” so she could advocate for herself in the event she needed medical care and her parents couldn’t get there on time.  

As she got older, the conversations got deeper and she learned more about how her parents felt. 

“Whenever I hear about the first year of my life, I feel empathy for my parents and my grandparents and my support system, because obviously that’s so scary,” she says. 

Liv’s younger brother was also born with holes in his heart, though they were smaller and he didn't have surgery. Growing up, both siblings had regular ultrasounds at a local hospital. Yearly donations to SickKids at Christmas became a family tradition. 

Today, Liv is in her final year of university studying psychology. She’s looking forward to becoming a psychotherapist and giving back to her community in any way she can. 

It ‘felt like coming home’ 

Liv says her mom always jumped at the chance to show her gratitude to SickKids. So she wasn’t surprised when, in 2020, her mom took the opportunity to apply for a one-year maternity leave contract for an HR role.  

“If I were given the honour of that job,” Kat says she remembers thinking, “I could give back to SickKids in a way, give back to the organization that saved my daughter and ride out the pandemic at the same time.” 

She applied and got the job. When she started and learned her portfolio, she discovered she’d be supporting the Labatt Family Heart Centre, specifically the Cardiac Critical Care Unit and unit 4D, where Liv recovered. 

“That night I was actually quite teary, telling my husband that I was going to be able to support the same people that supported us.” 

Liv knew her mom would take the job — and she also knew it was likely her mom would be offered the chance to stay on past the contract, because “my mom is really great at what she does.” 

“It was such a cool, full-circle moment and I was so happy to regain a more concrete relationship with SickKids,” Liv says.  

Says Kat of starting her job: “Being a member of the HR team at SickKids felt like coming home. It felt like it was the place I was supposed to be. And it was a very similar feeling when I was there with Liv — it was like a hug.” 

The pair walked in SickKids’ 150^th birthday parade in April, and, along with Liv’s dad, got a tour of the cardiology unit afterward.  

“It was so cool to put a picture to the story and see where I stayed and where my parents would come every day to be with me,” Liv says. “Being there and being able to hold my parents’ hands while they were walking through 4D and re-experiencing it, I felt really honoured to be there.” 

Today, Kat is a senior HR Business partner, helping employees successfully navigate their time at SickKids by providing operational and strategic consultative support to leaders and their teams. Her leaders know that whatever changes may come, she’s dedicated to keeping the Cardiology team in her portfolio.  

“I want to support them for as long as I can and be their advocates the way they were mine.”