Been exactly one year last friday. Its been a rough year but we've made it through. everybody has missed the food the most, employees, families and friends all miss it. We don't have anyone to crack the whip around here anymore either but everything is still moving along smoothly. Everybody knows she's looking down and wanting us to keep pushing hard and living in tomorrow instead of yesterday.
The holidays were pretty rough around here with the 1 year anniversary of mom passing away on December 30th, the 3 year anniversary of my girlfriends grandpa passing away on Dec 9th and then on December 13th her grandma on the side passed away also.
We had decided to use the memorials from the funeral and a lot of our own personal money to fund the Kitchen for the Restoring Hope Transplant House which is a few miles from the hospital where mom recieved her transplant and spent much of her time afterwards at.
This hospital is one of the top transplant hospitals in the area so a lot of people get sent to it from very far away.
The transplant process does not work on a first come first serve basis. They take each case individually and put you on the list based on how soon you need your transplant, what the rest of your health is like, your blood type, you social network (family friends to help you post transplant) and other factors. On non-emergency transplants these evaluations take awhile, on emergencies they are performed quickly. Not all people who need organ transplants need them immediately. Its like our trucks, some people just have some injectors going bad but can run fine for a year or so with minimal issues, others (like my mom for example), shoot rods out the side of the block. Then there are the factors of if you are healthy enough to go through the procedure and take care of it.
After all of that is done then you are in the national database and when a new organ is ready for transplant the database matches it to potential reciepients based on lab work and sometimes distance between the organ and recipient ,then ranks them in accordance with the UNOS policies, and then they begin offering it in order starting at the top of the list and working their way down.
For hearts there are 4 Statuses. 1A which are people that are on life support in the ICU, 1B which are people who are on an IV either at the hospital or at home in need of a heart, 2 which are the people who require a transplant but can go about life without an IV for the time being. 7 (inactive) these are the people who require a transplant at some time but currently are not on the list for any number of reasons.
In my moms case she was a 1A and was #2 on the national list for a heart that met the criteria.
Currently there are 112,707 people waiting for organ/tissue donations. 3,172 of them are waiting for a heart, 285 are status 1A, 931 are status 1B, 1019 are Status 2, and 939 are Status 7.
In our local transplant hospital there are 25 people waiting for hearts, 2 are 1A, 7 are 1B, 9 are 2, and 7 are 7.
There are 5 transplant clinics in Wisconsin.
When a transplant is offered you need to be close to the transplant center in order to receive your transplant or it will be offered to the next person. But since these clinics are so far apart, many people end up spending a lot of money renting a place, or staying in a hotel. Its not very fun, friendly or convenient which is why they are building the restoring hope house which can support 16 families. Each has their own room with their own bathroom, there are also visitation rooms, laundry and the big kitchen which takes some cues from my moms huge kitchen (28x14 with 82 cabinets/drawers floor to 9'ceiling). There will also be a plaque with here name in it. The entire house is actually a house, it is built into an old large Victorian so it doesn't have the "commercial" feel to it.
CNN featured it this summer here is a link to that video.
http://money.cnn.com/video/pf/2011/08/12/pf_bpl_middleton_wi_transplant.moneymag/
On Friday we had the family over for awhile and went down to the grave-site for a toast.
If I ever get my KW done it will be a tribute to her and organ donation.
And remember that signing you donor card doesn't always mean that you will be a donor, there is no national registry, although they are working on it. You have to talk to your family about it because it is still ultimately their decision in most states at most clinics.
The holidays were pretty rough around here with the 1 year anniversary of mom passing away on December 30th, the 3 year anniversary of my girlfriends grandpa passing away on Dec 9th and then on December 13th her grandma on the side passed away also.
We had decided to use the memorials from the funeral and a lot of our own personal money to fund the Kitchen for the Restoring Hope Transplant House which is a few miles from the hospital where mom recieved her transplant and spent much of her time afterwards at.
This hospital is one of the top transplant hospitals in the area so a lot of people get sent to it from very far away.
The transplant process does not work on a first come first serve basis. They take each case individually and put you on the list based on how soon you need your transplant, what the rest of your health is like, your blood type, you social network (family friends to help you post transplant) and other factors. On non-emergency transplants these evaluations take awhile, on emergencies they are performed quickly. Not all people who need organ transplants need them immediately. Its like our trucks, some people just have some injectors going bad but can run fine for a year or so with minimal issues, others (like my mom for example), shoot rods out the side of the block. Then there are the factors of if you are healthy enough to go through the procedure and take care of it.
After all of that is done then you are in the national database and when a new organ is ready for transplant the database matches it to potential reciepients based on lab work and sometimes distance between the organ and recipient ,then ranks them in accordance with the UNOS policies, and then they begin offering it in order starting at the top of the list and working their way down.
For hearts there are 4 Statuses. 1A which are people that are on life support in the ICU, 1B which are people who are on an IV either at the hospital or at home in need of a heart, 2 which are the people who require a transplant but can go about life without an IV for the time being. 7 (inactive) these are the people who require a transplant at some time but currently are not on the list for any number of reasons.
In my moms case she was a 1A and was #2 on the national list for a heart that met the criteria.
Currently there are 112,707 people waiting for organ/tissue donations. 3,172 of them are waiting for a heart, 285 are status 1A, 931 are status 1B, 1019 are Status 2, and 939 are Status 7.
In our local transplant hospital there are 25 people waiting for hearts, 2 are 1A, 7 are 1B, 9 are 2, and 7 are 7.
There are 5 transplant clinics in Wisconsin.
When a transplant is offered you need to be close to the transplant center in order to receive your transplant or it will be offered to the next person. But since these clinics are so far apart, many people end up spending a lot of money renting a place, or staying in a hotel. Its not very fun, friendly or convenient which is why they are building the restoring hope house which can support 16 families. Each has their own room with their own bathroom, there are also visitation rooms, laundry and the big kitchen which takes some cues from my moms huge kitchen (28x14 with 82 cabinets/drawers floor to 9'ceiling). There will also be a plaque with here name in it. The entire house is actually a house, it is built into an old large Victorian so it doesn't have the "commercial" feel to it.
CNN featured it this summer here is a link to that video.
http://money.cnn.com/video/pf/2011/08/12/pf_bpl_middleton_wi_transplant.moneymag/
On Friday we had the family over for awhile and went down to the grave-site for a toast.
If I ever get my KW done it will be a tribute to her and organ donation.
And remember that signing you donor card doesn't always mean that you will be a donor, there is no national registry, although they are working on it. You have to talk to your family about it because it is still ultimately their decision in most states at most clinics.
