Kidney For Karen And Everybody Who Needs A Kidney

It's 11:50 pm where I am at and I cannot sleep so I decided I'd post something in Steemit. I have insomnia due to anemia because I have kidney failure. My Steemit handle is mermaidvampire but my real name is Karen, I'm a dialysis patient. Anemia is a complication of kidney failure among many other things. To explain it further, without a hormone called epoetin from the kidneys, your bone marrows won't make blood, thus we oftentimes stay wide awake at night due to this anemia. We get that epoetin hormone via injections instead, a synthetic form of it. Tough life. But that's not even half of the things that we go through as dialysis patients. I won't bombard it all to you in one post. Maybe some other time I can share more about what we go through as patients.

For now, I want you all to hear us out and see if there is something you can do to help all of us kidney failure patients. As for me, I am desperate. Wait, I am not desperate, I am more than desperate.

I'm in the Philippines, sadly we do not have the best health care services here. Nothing is free and you're quite on your own when you are sick. There is help from the government but evidently, it can still be made better. As much as I want to rant about it here, I'd rather not, but I guess you have the idea of how it is here in the "third world."

Kidney failure is not just an issue here in the Philippines. It is also the leading deadly illness plaguing all other countries. The popular treatments for kidney failure are dialysis and transplant. Both are expensive and life-long treatments. Dialysis should be done a few sessions a week. There are a few types of dialysis, hemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis and home hemodialysis. All types of dialysis are time consuming and involves hours of being hooked to medical equipments or a dialysis machine two times a week of more or for some cases, nightly. The solutions and supplies are very costly. In fact, in the Philippines, if a family member is on dialysis, the economic status of the entire household goes lower and lower until they are buried in debts.

I am only 32 and I am so much capable of working, if I were normal. I used to be a corporate trainer for a BPO company but the illness ended that career. Now, a year and a half on dialysis, I find it so hard to find a job. Sadly, employment is even difficult for normal people, how much more for people who are considered Persons With Disability (PWD). We are considered PWD. There are a lot of others out there with kidney failure who are younger than me, and pretty sure we all are capable to do more given the chance of having a kidney transplant.

Kidney Transplant is not as much of a practice in the Philippines than in other modern countries because people are not informed and educated about the process other than it being expensive. When you are considering transplant like I do, you have to think about many things. Other than your well being, your readiness about the process, you have to think about having 2 million pesos for the procedure and a kidney donor. I do not have much money, I do not even have work, but I keep my hopes high that money is just around us. We can look for a job, we can do fundraising, we can ask the government and politicians, good samaritans, and any other means to have money and save up.

Other than the money aspect, my biggest problem is where can I get a kidney? Unfortunately, no one in my family has the same blood type as I do. I am an A+ while my siblings and parents are B+ and AB+. I think it is too much to ask other people for a kidney and also, in the Philippines, people are not aware about organ donation. In fact, there are a lot of misconceptions about organ donation which makes this concept very alien to everybody here. Now, you probably understand why I am desperate.

I have come to accept the fate of a kidney failure patient, it's tough but I try to live well with this. I am doing my dialysis regularly despite financial problems. I just got used to a lot of adjustments but I have come to terms with it and I am grateful for still being able to make it somehow. But I know I can do more if I get a transplant.

Another option for me, is to have a cadaver donor. Those patients who are in coma and whose family agrees for them to donate their organs, that's how it is. Here in the Philippines this can only be done in Manila and the procedure costs more than a regular transplant. Not to mention, there is a long list already for this type since, like I said, organ donation is not a thing in this country.

I am in the province, for me to be able to relocate to Manila for the transplant would be really costly. At this point, it is almost impossible but I am hoping for miracles.

I'm just sending this out there like a letter in a bottle set to sea. I want to call on you, whoever reads this post. Please share this and try to help us. There is a project that could change this situation. Not just my situation but everyone who has kidney failure. University of California, San Francisco is working on The Kidney Project. This is a scientific breakthrough of making a Bioartificial Kidney that can be used instead of a human kidney. They have been successful in the early stages of the project and it will be for human testing this year or the next. Now, they need the help of the government and everybody to make it possible. They too need money for the success of the Project. If you have something to spare or you have crowdfunding platforms, please consider helping them with donations. That will help all of us and the future.

This gives us hope. I am not sure I'd be able to live until this is out in the hospitals, but I guess that's fine. What matters is we need to support this Kidney Project and hopefully in the future the kidney failure patients won't have to despair like we do now.

Please please please do check them out and help. If you know anyone who has kidney failure, please do not forget to be a friend, as well. We all need the support we can get, it isn't easy to live a life like this. Thank you for reading this long post, I'm quite tired and sleepy now, hopefully I can now rest.

Please consider helping out and read about the Kidney Project on their official website on the link below.
https://pharm.ucsf.edu/kidney

*** image taken from the site: https://pharm.ucsf.edu/kidney