Carole Volz Medical Treatment Fund

Hello family, friends, acquaintances, and kind strangers. This is Lindsey and Emily Volz requesting help on behalf of our parents, Carole and Bud. In 2009 at age 48, our mother, Carole, was diagnosed with and began battling kidney disease. In April 2016, she started at home peritoneal dialysis treatments to combat her end stage renal failure. Our father, Bud, became her primary caregiver, learning every detail about administering sanitary and safe dialysis treatments, so our mother could remain at home. She was able to continue this type of treatment until earlier this year, when certain complications made hemodialysis her only option. This type of dialysis requires that patients receive treatments at a dialysis center three times weekly. During these treatments, they are connected to a machine for four to five hours and are then left exhausted but can otherwise live an almost normal life.


For the past few months, our mother has encountered complications with her dialysis treatments and diabetes. In January she developed two non-healing abdominal wounds that have each grown to 3x6 inches and 3 inches deep. They have been repeatedly operated on and she has obtained new bedsores that leave her at additional risk for infection. Due to the chronic pain from her wounds and repeated hospitalizations, she is no longer able to stand and walk on her own. She requires around the clock care that our father cannot provide.


Since our mother became too weak to be cared for at home starting on March 19th, she has been bounced around among New Britain General Hospital, Apple Rehab, Hartford Hospital, Kimberly Hall, and a variety of dialysis centers. We spent Easter, Mother’s Day, our parents’ 31st anniversary, Emily’s birthday, and Father’s Day in Hartford hospital. We celebrated our father, Bud’s, birthday at Kimberly Hall, eating cake around a hospital bed. As much as she would love to, our mother is nowhere near ready to come home. Just one week ago, our health insurance cut our mother off from coverage at skilled nursing facilities. She now has Medicare benefits, but as of August 1st, those will end and we will have to pay out of pocket to keep her there or decide on hospice care and discontinue treatments.


If you have ever met our mother, Carole, you know that she is funny, strong, and wants to be known as a fighter. At this point, her physical condition prevents her from coming home, but she is not ready to stop fighting. To keep her in a skilled nursing facility, like Kimberly Hall, where she is now, it will cost our family tens of thousands of dollars, depending on the types of therapies that are recommended for her and how long her stay ends up lasting. After her Medicare benefits end, our resources will be very limited, as we try to help our mother fight for her life. We, quite literally, need help buying her more time.


Once she can come home, the challenges will be just beginning. In order to speed up the process of transitioning her home, we plan to bring her home in a wheelchair. We need to put a ramp on the house and modify doorways and her bathroom. Depending on her mobility, we need to consider buying a used van with a lift, capable of transporting her in a wheelchair. These are things her insurance will not cover.


We appreciate any financial support you can give to assist our family at this time. For those who know her personally, whether you can donate or not, please consider visiting. Seeing new visitors and talking with friends assist her in maintaining her mental acuity and break up the monotony of living in a nursing facility. Please send one of us a private message to verify that she doesn't have any doctor's appointments when you want to visit.


Thank you and God bless.