Natasha Medical Fund
Donation protected
UPDATE (December 2017):
To my dear friends and all the kind souls who have answered my plea for help!
I send you my deepest gratitude for your donations, warm wishes and support this and last year. I am sorry for not updating on my situation regularly. It took me a a year to deal with different medical opinions and surgery options while I was going through constant physical therapy and various degrees of immobility, pain and desperation.
Thanks to you, I was able to fundraise enough money to pay for some of my medical debts and that made me brave enough (and sort of indebted) to finally face the major lower back surgery I had needed for some time.
I after consultations in Mount Sinai Hospital and Georgetown Hospital, I chose to go with Sentara Hospital in Norfolk, VA, where my life and mobility were saved back in 2001 and where the same team of trauma doctors could deal with my situation.
Last week I had the first of two (or three) surgeries I need to get back to my feet. So far it seemed to be successful so once I recover enough I am going back to Moscow not to involve my family into my long recovery process. This recovery means that I will be on crutches for several months and then learning to walk once more. Depending on the success of recovery and the pain levels after that, the timing and urgency of the next surgery will be considered.
So, those are my news. It feels like thanks to you I was able to move the mountain that blocked my way to health. It is still a long way but I hope I will be able to walk it through all the way. Just walk. Literary.
Thank you again for you support. Since I am dealing with my disability since 2001, I am very used to concealing my situation. I prefer to suffer privately and not to post or talk much about what I am going through. Dealing with too much attention to my situation sometimes is as hard for me as dealing with the chronic pain. However, I still need funds to cover my past medical debts and I hope that my co-payments for the current hospital stay will be reasonable. I still rely on you kind hearts, giving hands and ask to spread the word.
I send you all my blessings this Holiday Season. I celebrate it with deep gratitude and wishes for the best health to all of you and your families!
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(October 2016)
Now is my time to ask the world for help.
I became disabled back in 2001. I was a victim of a shark attack in North Carolina, much covered by the news at the time, which also took away the life of my dear fiancé. The same shark had also killed a boy two days earlier, and that made me sole survivor of a truly horrific event.
I was also a miracle because, first, I was not supposed to survive, and next, I was not supposed to walk. Not only have I lost part of my left leg and suffered some damage to my hand – my sciatic nerve and nerves in the lower spine were severely damaged as well. I have gone through 7 reconstructive surgeries and prosthesis, dealt with depression, chronic pain and limited mobility and went back to work in 2002.
Financially, it turned out to by my great mistake. I lost my full disability status with government and my Medicaid. I got overwhelmed with medical bills from my previous surgeries, which soon went to collection agencies, since I was not earning enough to pay outrageous bills of more than $300 000. These medical debts from 2001 continued to haunt me for years, ruining my credit history and hunting any increase in my salary.
However, my work had a very generous health insurance, and that was a blessing, since a new amputee needs to change several prostheses on the course of finally acquiring the permanent one. My insurance also fully covered 3 consecutive surgeries I had in the Georgetown Hospital in 2005.
That is where my story really starts. I needed whose surgeries because my condition had gradually worsened, and the pain in the sciatica and lower spine had totally crippled me. The surgeries were a success, and I got back on my feet. I felt like I need to live my life to the fullest while I could, and I went on first to travel and then to live abroad.
After many years, I got my debts written off; I got Medicare to partially cover my very regular prosthetic needs, and started to be self-employed as a yoga teacher and hospice volunteer (that's where my disability has brought me). My yearly medical bills (Medicare deductibles, copayments and supplementals) amounted for about $5000, which was manageable for my family.
Last year, two developments shuttered this precarious balance - the increase in my Medicare coopayments and serious deterioration in my health condition. At first, I was optimistic since a similar problem was once resolved back in 2005. However, the Georgetown Hospital is not covered by my Maryland Medicare. The surgery I had in Moscow last winter improved my condition for about six months; the subsequent surgery in the John Hopkins this August was not successful at all. I am currently undergoing physiotherapeutic treatment, and my condition seems to have returned to the status quo - not too good, but at least tolerable.
My medical bills for this year have already amounted to about $15 000, and I am in the process of getting even deeper in debt by buying an insurance that will cover me in the Georgetown Hospital. Getting treated there is my main hope and I am grasping at it.
I feel very depressed and devastated by this whole thing. I am in pain, and I am not earning enough to deal with my current medical needs. I believe that help comes when it is needed, and I am very grateful to receive it. I will pay it forward, once I can get enough of my heath back to go on helping others.
To my dear friends and all the kind souls who have answered my plea for help!
I send you my deepest gratitude for your donations, warm wishes and support this and last year. I am sorry for not updating on my situation regularly. It took me a a year to deal with different medical opinions and surgery options while I was going through constant physical therapy and various degrees of immobility, pain and desperation.
Thanks to you, I was able to fundraise enough money to pay for some of my medical debts and that made me brave enough (and sort of indebted) to finally face the major lower back surgery I had needed for some time.
I after consultations in Mount Sinai Hospital and Georgetown Hospital, I chose to go with Sentara Hospital in Norfolk, VA, where my life and mobility were saved back in 2001 and where the same team of trauma doctors could deal with my situation.
Last week I had the first of two (or three) surgeries I need to get back to my feet. So far it seemed to be successful so once I recover enough I am going back to Moscow not to involve my family into my long recovery process. This recovery means that I will be on crutches for several months and then learning to walk once more. Depending on the success of recovery and the pain levels after that, the timing and urgency of the next surgery will be considered.
So, those are my news. It feels like thanks to you I was able to move the mountain that blocked my way to health. It is still a long way but I hope I will be able to walk it through all the way. Just walk. Literary.
Thank you again for you support. Since I am dealing with my disability since 2001, I am very used to concealing my situation. I prefer to suffer privately and not to post or talk much about what I am going through. Dealing with too much attention to my situation sometimes is as hard for me as dealing with the chronic pain. However, I still need funds to cover my past medical debts and I hope that my co-payments for the current hospital stay will be reasonable. I still rely on you kind hearts, giving hands and ask to spread the word.
I send you all my blessings this Holiday Season. I celebrate it with deep gratitude and wishes for the best health to all of you and your families!
-------------------------------------------------
-------------------------------------------------
(October 2016)
Now is my time to ask the world for help.
I became disabled back in 2001. I was a victim of a shark attack in North Carolina, much covered by the news at the time, which also took away the life of my dear fiancé. The same shark had also killed a boy two days earlier, and that made me sole survivor of a truly horrific event.
I was also a miracle because, first, I was not supposed to survive, and next, I was not supposed to walk. Not only have I lost part of my left leg and suffered some damage to my hand – my sciatic nerve and nerves in the lower spine were severely damaged as well. I have gone through 7 reconstructive surgeries and prosthesis, dealt with depression, chronic pain and limited mobility and went back to work in 2002.
Financially, it turned out to by my great mistake. I lost my full disability status with government and my Medicaid. I got overwhelmed with medical bills from my previous surgeries, which soon went to collection agencies, since I was not earning enough to pay outrageous bills of more than $300 000. These medical debts from 2001 continued to haunt me for years, ruining my credit history and hunting any increase in my salary.
However, my work had a very generous health insurance, and that was a blessing, since a new amputee needs to change several prostheses on the course of finally acquiring the permanent one. My insurance also fully covered 3 consecutive surgeries I had in the Georgetown Hospital in 2005.
That is where my story really starts. I needed whose surgeries because my condition had gradually worsened, and the pain in the sciatica and lower spine had totally crippled me. The surgeries were a success, and I got back on my feet. I felt like I need to live my life to the fullest while I could, and I went on first to travel and then to live abroad.
After many years, I got my debts written off; I got Medicare to partially cover my very regular prosthetic needs, and started to be self-employed as a yoga teacher and hospice volunteer (that's where my disability has brought me). My yearly medical bills (Medicare deductibles, copayments and supplementals) amounted for about $5000, which was manageable for my family.
Last year, two developments shuttered this precarious balance - the increase in my Medicare coopayments and serious deterioration in my health condition. At first, I was optimistic since a similar problem was once resolved back in 2005. However, the Georgetown Hospital is not covered by my Maryland Medicare. The surgery I had in Moscow last winter improved my condition for about six months; the subsequent surgery in the John Hopkins this August was not successful at all. I am currently undergoing physiotherapeutic treatment, and my condition seems to have returned to the status quo - not too good, but at least tolerable.
My medical bills for this year have already amounted to about $15 000, and I am in the process of getting even deeper in debt by buying an insurance that will cover me in the Georgetown Hospital. Getting treated there is my main hope and I am grasping at it.
I feel very depressed and devastated by this whole thing. I am in pain, and I am not earning enough to deal with my current medical needs. I believe that help comes when it is needed, and I am very grateful to receive it. I will pay it forward, once I can get enough of my heath back to go on helping others.
Organizer
Natalya Zayts
Organizer
Gaithersburg, MD