Semele
March 4th, 2004, 10:56 AM
Ok, So I think you have all seen the Great Strides fundraiser link by now. If not just follow the link in my sig. You all know that Flar7, one of the administrators of this site and a very dear friend of this family has CF, but there are many, many more. One of my other dear friends fighting the CF battle is Ashley Guthrie who was featured in this article in the Tulsa World this last Sunday. I thought I would include it here for you all to read. She is a very courageuos woman and we are praying daily for her to be able to recieve the lung transplant that can give her a little more time on this earth. Also..for some odd reason the pic wouldn't load up in the context of the article..so it is added at the bottom. *shrug*
Two women still await double LUNG TRANSPLANTs
NELLIE KELLY World Staff Writer
02/29/2004
Tulsa World (Final Home Edition), Page A1 of News
View in Print (PDF) Format (http://www.tulsaworld.com/TWPDFs/2004/Final/a_1_2_29_2004.PDF)
http://www.tulsaworld.com/images/Photonotavail.gif (http://www.tulsaworld.com/archivesearch/Search/ArchiveArticleConfirm.asp?ArticleID=040229_Ne_a1_two#)
From left, Heather Cain Martin, 28, and Ashley Guthrie, 22, sit in Ashley’s room at St. John Medical Center. Both are awaiting double lung transplants. A third young woman died in December while awaiting a transplant.
KELLY KERR / Tulsa World
Six months after three young women awaiting LUNG TRANSPLANTs met, one has died and two struggle with health.
One death, several hospitalizations and stronger medicine have been the fates of three local women who need double LUNG TRANSPLANTs.
Since the Tulsa World wrote about Melissa Stites-Wolfe, Ashley Guthrie and Heather Cain Martin in August, their conditions have not improved.
"It's too much reality," Martin said. "Melissa's gone, and Ashley is in the hospital. And it has only been six months."
Stites-Wolf, 26, died Dec. 3.
Guthrie, 22, has been hospitalized for months at a time.
Martin, 28, although still the healthiest in the group, has felt her heart deteriorate even more.
In August, Stites-Wolfe said that she wasn't sure she'd live long enough to receive a second double LUNG TRANSPLANT. Her first transplant was rejected and she hoped to be one of the first patients to receive two transplants so that doctors could study her progress.
After the three women met for a newspaper photo at Stites-Wolfe's home, Guthrie and Stites-Wolfe became friends. The two wrote each other e-mails even when Stites-Wolfe had moved to St. Louis to be ready for new lungs when they arrived.
Although she told Guthrie that she was getting sicker, she always remained upbeat, Guthrie said.
"I'm so glad I got to know her because she told me that even though she only had three years, they were the best of her life," Guthrie said. "So it gave me hope."
Because the two were born with cystic fibrosis, a chronic condition that scars the lungs, they each knew how the other felt.
"It's sad, but I've had so many friends that have passed away," Guthrie said. "I don't want to say I'm used to it, but I guess it's part of life."
The Stites family flew in a medical jet from intensive care at St. Francis Hospital to intensive care at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, said Melissa's mother, Lynda Stites. Eventually, doctors told her that she was no longer a candidate for transplant because she was too sick.
Her mother encouraged the family to go back home, she said, so they headed back to Tulsa in a motor home, with Melissa lying on a bed in the back. After about a week at her parents' house, she died.
During trips to St. Louis, Melissa had discussed with her mother the details of her funeral. She requested lilies -- the flower of her birth month and also flowers known for being beautiful, yet having a short life.
She had dictated letters to her husband, Danny Wolfe, for each of her family members, and she asked her mother to write her letter to Danny, all to be read at the funeral, Stites said.
Last Monday was the fourth anniversary of Melissa's transplant, her mother said, and she cried all day. But she enjoys talking about her daughter to keep her memory alive, she said.
"One of her concerns was that she'd no longer be able to make a difference," Stites said. "Anytime I can help her life change others, I want to do it."
Martin found out about Stites-Wolfe's death several weeks later. Her father and husband knew but decided not to upset her. One day while she and her husband were driving, she said she wondered how Melissa was doing.
"He got really quiet," Martin said.
That's when she found out that her friend had died.
As for her own health, Martin is still well enough to work as a social worker for the Department of Human Services. She and her husband have bought and are remodeling a house, and they have a new puppy.
But she tires easily and is preparing to go to St. Louis to begin continuous therapy for her heart. Soon, she will wear a pump that delivers medicine through a catheter into her side. The medicine, called Remodulin, will help her heart so that she doesn't lose her breath so easily.
Martin's condition, called pulmonary hypertension, or high blood pressure in the lungs, is destroying her heart, but when she receives new lungs, her heart will improve, Martin said.
She has been listed for a transplant since October, but her doctors aren't sure she'll be sick enough for a transplant when lungs become available.
"While I appear to be doing very well, my heart is poor, and that could change any day," she said.
Guthrie is trying to stay healthy enough to receive a transplant within the next six months. She was listed for a transplant 15 months ago, and an average wait is about two years, she said.
She was in the hospital from October to December at St. John Medical Center because of low lung function and pneumonia.
Since Jan. 22, she has been at St. John for sinus surgery and to recover from a respiratory infection called pseudomonas, which especially affects the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients.
At the hospital, she receives breathing treatments, oral medicine and IV medication.
Because of her recent hospitalizations, Guthrie took off college for the fall and spring semesters, she said.
In mid-March, she is scheduled to go for a second transplant evaluation in St. Louis and to discuss with doctors when she should move there to wait for new lungs.
Six months ago, Guthrie left her oxygen tube behind for the newspaper photo. Back then, she would hide it if she saw someone who didn't know how sick she was because the tube in her nose embarrassed her.
Now, with her lung capacity hovering around 27 percent, she's on oxygen all the time, and she sleeps wearing a mask that blows high-pressure air into her nose. The pressure keeps the airway open so that she doesn't stop breathing at night.
"I take medicine around the clock," Guthrie said. "I'm on oxygen all the time now. I can't go without it at all."
Although the two surviving women are examples of the need for organ donation, the number of donors remains low.
Oklahoma has 22 candidates for LUNG TRANSPLANTs -- up four from six months ago -- and 549 people waiting for all types of organs. The two local women are not included in the numbers because they plan to have transplants out of state.
Nationally, 3,876 people are candidates for LUNG TRANSPLANTs. In August, more than 82,500 people in the United States were waiting for an organ. Now that number has climbed to 83,295.
But the number of donors in Oklahoma last year was 123 -- 38 living donors and 85 deceased. It's an improvement over 2002, but still not enough to meet the needs of people dying of organ failure.
Since 1988, only 86 people have donated their lungs in Oklahoma.
Those statistics scare Guthrie and Cain because their lives depend on the generosity of those who die and the families who allow their organs to be donated.
"We're your sister," Martin said. "We're your daughter. You can't imagine what this does to a family."
One of Stites-Wolfe's wishes was to be an organ donor, and more than 20 people benefited from her donations. Other patients received her heart valves, ligaments and skin, her mother said.
Guthrie keeps a newspaper advertisement featuring Stites-Wolfe's story of being both a recipient and a donor. It is folded inside the cover of a notebook next to her hospital bed, and it reminds of her own fragile health.
"I tell everyone, 'Donate, donate, donate,' " Guthrie said. " 'Did you check the box?' "
Nellie Kelly 581-8475
nellie.kelly@tulsaworld.com (nellie.kelly@tulsaworld.com)
Two women still await double LUNG TRANSPLANTs
NELLIE KELLY World Staff Writer
02/29/2004
Tulsa World (Final Home Edition), Page A1 of News
View in Print (PDF) Format (http://www.tulsaworld.com/TWPDFs/2004/Final/a_1_2_29_2004.PDF)
http://www.tulsaworld.com/images/Photonotavail.gif (http://www.tulsaworld.com/archivesearch/Search/ArchiveArticleConfirm.asp?ArticleID=040229_Ne_a1_two#)
From left, Heather Cain Martin, 28, and Ashley Guthrie, 22, sit in Ashley’s room at St. John Medical Center. Both are awaiting double lung transplants. A third young woman died in December while awaiting a transplant.
KELLY KERR / Tulsa World
Six months after three young women awaiting LUNG TRANSPLANTs met, one has died and two struggle with health.
One death, several hospitalizations and stronger medicine have been the fates of three local women who need double LUNG TRANSPLANTs.
Since the Tulsa World wrote about Melissa Stites-Wolfe, Ashley Guthrie and Heather Cain Martin in August, their conditions have not improved.
"It's too much reality," Martin said. "Melissa's gone, and Ashley is in the hospital. And it has only been six months."
Stites-Wolf, 26, died Dec. 3.
Guthrie, 22, has been hospitalized for months at a time.
Martin, 28, although still the healthiest in the group, has felt her heart deteriorate even more.
In August, Stites-Wolfe said that she wasn't sure she'd live long enough to receive a second double LUNG TRANSPLANT. Her first transplant was rejected and she hoped to be one of the first patients to receive two transplants so that doctors could study her progress.
After the three women met for a newspaper photo at Stites-Wolfe's home, Guthrie and Stites-Wolfe became friends. The two wrote each other e-mails even when Stites-Wolfe had moved to St. Louis to be ready for new lungs when they arrived.
Although she told Guthrie that she was getting sicker, she always remained upbeat, Guthrie said.
"I'm so glad I got to know her because she told me that even though she only had three years, they were the best of her life," Guthrie said. "So it gave me hope."
Because the two were born with cystic fibrosis, a chronic condition that scars the lungs, they each knew how the other felt.
"It's sad, but I've had so many friends that have passed away," Guthrie said. "I don't want to say I'm used to it, but I guess it's part of life."
The Stites family flew in a medical jet from intensive care at St. Francis Hospital to intensive care at Barnes Jewish Hospital in St. Louis, said Melissa's mother, Lynda Stites. Eventually, doctors told her that she was no longer a candidate for transplant because she was too sick.
Her mother encouraged the family to go back home, she said, so they headed back to Tulsa in a motor home, with Melissa lying on a bed in the back. After about a week at her parents' house, she died.
During trips to St. Louis, Melissa had discussed with her mother the details of her funeral. She requested lilies -- the flower of her birth month and also flowers known for being beautiful, yet having a short life.
She had dictated letters to her husband, Danny Wolfe, for each of her family members, and she asked her mother to write her letter to Danny, all to be read at the funeral, Stites said.
Last Monday was the fourth anniversary of Melissa's transplant, her mother said, and she cried all day. But she enjoys talking about her daughter to keep her memory alive, she said.
"One of her concerns was that she'd no longer be able to make a difference," Stites said. "Anytime I can help her life change others, I want to do it."
Martin found out about Stites-Wolfe's death several weeks later. Her father and husband knew but decided not to upset her. One day while she and her husband were driving, she said she wondered how Melissa was doing.
"He got really quiet," Martin said.
That's when she found out that her friend had died.
As for her own health, Martin is still well enough to work as a social worker for the Department of Human Services. She and her husband have bought and are remodeling a house, and they have a new puppy.
But she tires easily and is preparing to go to St. Louis to begin continuous therapy for her heart. Soon, she will wear a pump that delivers medicine through a catheter into her side. The medicine, called Remodulin, will help her heart so that she doesn't lose her breath so easily.
Martin's condition, called pulmonary hypertension, or high blood pressure in the lungs, is destroying her heart, but when she receives new lungs, her heart will improve, Martin said.
She has been listed for a transplant since October, but her doctors aren't sure she'll be sick enough for a transplant when lungs become available.
"While I appear to be doing very well, my heart is poor, and that could change any day," she said.
Guthrie is trying to stay healthy enough to receive a transplant within the next six months. She was listed for a transplant 15 months ago, and an average wait is about two years, she said.
She was in the hospital from October to December at St. John Medical Center because of low lung function and pneumonia.
Since Jan. 22, she has been at St. John for sinus surgery and to recover from a respiratory infection called pseudomonas, which especially affects the lungs of cystic fibrosis patients.
At the hospital, she receives breathing treatments, oral medicine and IV medication.
Because of her recent hospitalizations, Guthrie took off college for the fall and spring semesters, she said.
In mid-March, she is scheduled to go for a second transplant evaluation in St. Louis and to discuss with doctors when she should move there to wait for new lungs.
Six months ago, Guthrie left her oxygen tube behind for the newspaper photo. Back then, she would hide it if she saw someone who didn't know how sick she was because the tube in her nose embarrassed her.
Now, with her lung capacity hovering around 27 percent, she's on oxygen all the time, and she sleeps wearing a mask that blows high-pressure air into her nose. The pressure keeps the airway open so that she doesn't stop breathing at night.
"I take medicine around the clock," Guthrie said. "I'm on oxygen all the time now. I can't go without it at all."
Although the two surviving women are examples of the need for organ donation, the number of donors remains low.
Oklahoma has 22 candidates for LUNG TRANSPLANTs -- up four from six months ago -- and 549 people waiting for all types of organs. The two local women are not included in the numbers because they plan to have transplants out of state.
Nationally, 3,876 people are candidates for LUNG TRANSPLANTs. In August, more than 82,500 people in the United States were waiting for an organ. Now that number has climbed to 83,295.
But the number of donors in Oklahoma last year was 123 -- 38 living donors and 85 deceased. It's an improvement over 2002, but still not enough to meet the needs of people dying of organ failure.
Since 1988, only 86 people have donated their lungs in Oklahoma.
Those statistics scare Guthrie and Cain because their lives depend on the generosity of those who die and the families who allow their organs to be donated.
"We're your sister," Martin said. "We're your daughter. You can't imagine what this does to a family."
One of Stites-Wolfe's wishes was to be an organ donor, and more than 20 people benefited from her donations. Other patients received her heart valves, ligaments and skin, her mother said.
Guthrie keeps a newspaper advertisement featuring Stites-Wolfe's story of being both a recipient and a donor. It is folded inside the cover of a notebook next to her hospital bed, and it reminds of her own fragile health.
"I tell everyone, 'Donate, donate, donate,' " Guthrie said. " 'Did you check the box?' "
Nellie Kelly 581-8475
nellie.kelly@tulsaworld.com (nellie.kelly@tulsaworld.com)