Help Connie on her Journey to a Lung Transplant

Amy Christopher Rowe is organizing this fundraiser on behalf of Connie Christopher.

Donation protected

~Amy Christopher Rowe, Organizer

We can't thank you all enough for your support, thoughts, prayers & shares for Connie! Please keep sharing.

9/14/24: After months of prayer, we launched this campaign to support our sweet Aunt Connie on a challenging journey. Last year she got a devastating diagnosis: Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis (IPF), a progressive lung disease with no known cause, no cure and terminal in 3-5 years without a Lung Transplant. Connie is now 2 yrs into the disease.

In Feb 2023, severe shortness of breath & elevated heart rates led to months of extensive cardio & pulmonary testing & the devastating diagnosis, confirmed by 2nd opinion from an IPF expert at UT Houston. She's now on an expensive medication that may slow progression of the fibrosis. It’s Not a cure, but we pray it will give her extra time to prepare physically, medically, emotionally & financially for this unexpected journey.

Currently, our goal is to get Connie to & through an Evaluation for Transplant at Baylor St Luke’s, hopefully, April or May 2025. We want to offset past medical debt (more about that below), ongoing IPF meds, pulmonary rehab to breathe more efficiently & build strength before undergoing the evaluation, CT scans, Lung Function and other tests, & the extensive evaluation process of cancer screenings, lung, kidney, liver, colon & heart scans & heart cath. If any problems are found, treatment(s) will be needed before admittance to the program. If accepted by Baylor, their transplant team will monitor her lung function decline, increased supplemental O² needs & any exacerbations or hospitalizations in order to be placed on & moved up the transplant list as needed.

Some of you are aware of Connie’s long battle w/Chronic Lyme Disease. Misdiagnoses & delayed treatment from 1994-99, have resulted in 30 yrs of worsening muscle, joint & connective tissue pain, increasing fatigue, CNS anomalies & cognitive issues despite long-term IV antibiotics (2000 & 2012). In 2004, a Lyme-related heart valve infection led to an add'l 12 wks of IV antibiotics which, once healed, left her w/an ongoing cardiac arrhythmia.

In March 2020, Connie was hospitalized with two strokes causing some vision loss & cognitive deficits - possibly a result of Covid thought to be a bad cold in Feb '20, before we knew much about Covid. She also has a hereditary progressive tremor worsened by the strokes.

These medical issues have left Connie physically & financially drained from hospitalizations, expensive treatments, myriad medications & being limited to part-time work since 2014. Now, unable to work since Jan 2024, she has depleted the last of her retirement savings awaiting Disability approval.

We pray we can come together to alleviate Connie’s financial anxieties & give her the best chance at success as she begins this journey.

Thank you so much for your support, prayers, good thoughts & for sharing this campaign with your social networks! We are so grateful & may God bless you all!

Amy Christopher Rowe & Family

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P.S. Please consider becoming an organ donor & give the gift of life. See Donate Life

For more about Idiopathic Pulmonary Fibrosis: IPF Information