Hope for Kelli

Kelli’s Story

Kelli is an extraordinary nurse and wonderful daughter, sister, aunt, niece, and friend. She enjoys yoga, running, hiking, and traveling. Recently, in addition to being a nurse, Kelli began pursuing her masters degree in nursing from Grand Canyon University and was even awarded the Dawn Gross Scholarship from M.D. Anderson Cancer Center.  

Kelli has been fighting hard with a very tough battle of Guillain Barre Syndrome (GBS), a rare autoimmune disease which attacks the nerves and causes paralysis. Kelli has been battling this disease for over 7 weeks now and was first admitted to the hospital on 3/30/21. Her doctors believe it was brought on by the 2nd Pfizer COVID vaccine. Kelli was healthy before the vaccine and got it to protect her patients. 

Kelli's case of GBS has been relentless and not responding well to treatments that most cases respond well to. This has made it very frustrating as we haven't found what treatment's / treatment combinations are needed to first get her disease to plateau (stop continuing to progress and keep relapsing). Her doctors feel her case of GBS is trending towards the chronic form of GBS called Chronic Inflammatory Demyelinating Polyneuropathy (CIDP), which can be confirmed next week.

Kelli has endured the following very tough treatments over the last 7 weeks:  7 IVIG, 10 Plasmapheresis (Plex for short), and 1 IV high-dose chemotherapy (on 5/5). 

Kelli can only move her hands, neck, and shrug her shoulders. She is unable to grip or hold things. Kelli has been unable to eat by mouth for 4 weeks due to the GBS impacting her swallowing and has been relying on a feeding tube.

Her voice has been very faint for weeks. She was relying on a Bi-pap breathing machine to help prolong keeping her off the ventilator for weeks until her diaphragm was just too weak coupled with the procedures to get her longer-term feeding tube in place, which resulted in her now using the ventilator full-time through a tracheotomy.

Kelli would be very grateful and humble for any donations received to be used for medical bills, equipment, and care. Please keep Kelli in your prayers.