A Kelowna mom battling an autoimmune disease says she feels forgotten by the health-care system.<\/p>\n
Lindsay Reichelt \u2014 who has battled the disease for 18 years \u2014 is now entering her tenth month on the liver transplant waitlist.<\/p>\n
She says, despite being told she would \u201cskyrocket to the top of the list\u201d due to her condition, priority for her transplant remains low due to a system that miscalculates the severity of her disease.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was very ill and in the hospital and was given six months to live, approximately,\u201d Reichelt said. \u201cMy doctors urged me to find a live donor, because it was a very real possibility that I was going to die on the waitlist while waiting for a liver.\u201d<\/p>\n
Reichelt says she feels like a number on an inaccurate list. While doctors repeatedly confirm her illness is severe, her MELD score \u2014 a system used to rank priority of patients \u2014 has kept her at the lower end of B.C.\u2019s liver transplant list.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey tell me they can\u2019t and won\u2019t change my MELD score number,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey say I\u2019m not the only one dealing with this issue, that this affects all autoimmune patients on the waitlist.\u201d<\/p>\n
She says doctors have repeatedly raised concerns about the MELD score system undervaluing autoimmune patients.<\/p>\n
Now, as she enters her tenth month on the liver transplant list, Reichelt is asking for a change to the assessment system \u2014 to no avail.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey tell me this is the way it is, this is the way it\u2019s always been for us.\u201d<\/p>\n
She is now calling for clarity from BC Transplant before it is too late. After months of waiting, she now has two potential live donors. However, she hasn\u2019t received any updates or a surgery date.<\/p>\n
\u201cSo here we are today, still waiting, still no update from anyone, with no answers, and we are going into high cold and flu season,\u201d Reichelt said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWith no immune system and without a liver that is working properly, getting a bad flu or getting something like pneumonia could be it for me.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A Kelowna mom battling an autoimmune disease says she feels forgotten by the health-care system. Lindsay Reichelt \u2014…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":277369,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[34],"tags":[49,48,84,392],"class_list":{"0":"post-277368","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-healthcare","8":"tag-ca","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-health","11":"tag-healthcare"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=277368"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/277368\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/277369"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=277368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=277368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=277368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}