Little Angels Prescribed Pediatric Extended Care (PPEC) will open a new location within the next two weeks at 1023 West Orange Blossom Trail. 

The special needs daycare will share space with One World Pediatrics, whose founders, Drs. Jag Ambwani and Dolly Ubhrani, serve as Little Angels’ medical directors. Little Angels Apopka will work with the Longwood and Orlando locations to provide therapy, transportation and a food program to children with diverse medical needs. 

“Sometimes, the hospital will call us and be like, ‘Hey, we have a baby that needs a PPEC, and they’ll refer them right from the hospital,” regional director of nursing Christy Columbus said. “We can take kids with trachs, ventilators, G tubes—you’ll see a variety of different kids—and we’re staffed with RNs, LPNs and CANs to be able to meet all the medical needs.” 

Columbus said the team recognized the need for a Little Angels in Apopka when they received several transportation requests from city residents. 

“It was a long commute from Longwood to Apopka, so it was gonna help with that transportation issue, too,” Columbus said. 

Columbus currently works from Little Angels Longwood but will also assist the Apopka location once it opens. Her primary role is to write and update each patient’s plan of care.  

“These kids see like seven to ten doctors,” Columbus said. “So it’s our job as a PPEC to keep up with all those orders, keep up with every doctor, and change their plan to reflect what that child needs every day.” 

Columbus entered the medical field as a NICU nurse after earning her bachelor’s degree in nursing from the University of Central Florida (UCF). But she finds her work at Little Angels more rewarding, since she gets to build deeper relationships with the patients and their families. 

Ultimately, Columbus wants to provide early intervention for children like her son. When her son was younger, Columbus would work as a NICU nurse over the weekend. But when he was 20 months old, he started seizing and became a completely different person. 

“He was this vigorous child with bright eyes and a full future,” Columbus said. “When I brought him back, he wasn’t himself. He had those dead eyes. He stopped talking, he couldn’t walk anymore, and he didn’t want to eat.” 

After her son started acting differently, Columbus would pay out-of-pocket to bring her son to therapy Monday-Thursday, since Florida’s free early intervention program did not give her son the attention he needed. 

“They were giving me this gloom and doom synopsis of my child,” Columbus said. “I was like, ‘You don’t know him. I believe in him. If I don’t believe in him, who will?’” 

Now, thanks to early intervention, her 20-year-old son can drive and works “a big boy job.” She credits him for his hard work. 

“Like, yes, we’re pushing you to go to therapies, but you taught yourself how to talk through those little neuron pathways,” Columbus said. “You go, buddy!” 

Columbus’ desire to help children like her son led her to earn a master’s degree in pediatric health from UCF in 2014 and to join the Little Angels team in 2021. And the other staff share a similar passion. Many have worked in pediatrics for over 15 years, and several staff members have children with special needs. 

Little Angels PRN Daviqua Riley, who will also be helping at the Apopka location, placed her son in Little Angels after trying a different PPEC.  

“Some things my son wasn’t doing, he is doing now with the help of therapy,” Riley said.  
Riley said her son can now tie his shoes, and Little Angels is also teaching him how to read and spell his name. 

“I’ve been very passionate as far as caring for medically needy kids because I’m on both sides of it,” Riley said. “I know how it is as a parent, and I know how it is as a worker.” 

Columbus said she wishes she could help more children, but she is grateful for the opportunity she has discovered through Little Angels. 

“God gave me the best gift in the world,” Columbus said. “He gave me my son back. If I can help anybody else get their kids to that level, I want to.”