gofundme.com/save-adebimpes-mum
Majekodunmi on her sick bed
Gbenro Adeoye
If Adebimpe Dipe, 28, could turn back the hands of time, she would
rewrite history to make her mother well again. Adebimpe’s lonely battle
to save the life of her mother, Abosede Majekodunmi, 53, a chronic
kidney failure patient, has overwhelmed her with confusing emotions –
fear, worry and sadness.
The two only have each other: Majekodunmi, a retired Director of
Community Development with Ogun State government, is a single mother
with Adebimpe being her only child.
Since early 2017, Majekodunmi has been having dialysis sessions but the
cost is increasingly becoming too heavy for her child, friends and other
family members to bear. Adebimpe is now desperate to raise the N20m
estimated cost of kidney transplant to save her mother’s life.Adebimpe
said, “It started around October last year (2016). She was complaining
of stomachache and headache – the kind of a headache and stomach pain
that didn’t seem to be normal. After a while, it was fatigue; she was
always weak, she couldn’t climb the stairs or walk a short distance. She
couldn’t drive or do most of the things she used to do.
“She went to a hospital in Ota (in Ogun State) and they kept telling her
it was malaria and typhoid fever. But her condition did not improve.
She was told that the typhoid fever might take time to go because she
was elderly. I told her to use another hospital and there, she was told
that her Packed Cell Volume was low and that she should be eating lots
of vegetables. I was not pleased with that recommendation. How much
vegetable can you eat to bring up your blood level if it was said to be
at 14 per cent?
“But I was in Lagos while she was in Ota. Then she went for a church
programme and was admitted at the church’s health centre for about five
days. They gave her two pints of blood to boost her PCV and by the time
she left there, her blood level had increased to 23 per cent. But the
problem was that none of the hospitals ran any test to find out what was
bringing her PCV down. That was the foundation of the issue.
“She felt okay but after one week, it relapsed. She came to my place in
Lagos, and at that moment, I had just finished my master’s degree
programme and just started working but had not been paid.
“On December 30, 2016, when she got her salary, we decided to go for a
comprehensive test. She was working with the Ogun State Government and
retired as the Director, Community Development. She retired in May,
2017. It was after comprehensive tests were carried out at a laboratory
in Lagos that we found out about the kidney problem.”
Majekodunmi was referred to the Lagos State University Teaching
Hospital, Ikeja for dialysis, but according to Adebimpe, all the health
workers did at the public hospital was to measure her mother’s vital
signs and direct them to a private hospital in Ikeja GRA because their
dialysis machine was not functional.
“We took her to the private hospital and in all, we spent over N800,000
that week because by the second day, her blood pressure was low and she
was already passing out. Her friends, her church members and a lot of
distant family members showed love,” Adebimpe said.
Doctors at the hospital where Majekodunmi has been receiving treatment
had advised her to have three dialysis sessions but the cost of that has
been a burden too heavy for Adebimpe and her mother to bear, hence the
need for financial support from the public to fund kidney transplant
that will restore Majekodunmi’s health.
Adebimpe said, “Her dialysis costs N27,000 per session and she takes
Epogen injection per session, which costs N11,000. Then there is a test
she does after each session to be sure that everything is balanced. The
post-dialysis test costs N2,000. That is N40,000 per session. Doing this
three times a week makes it N120,000 per week and N480,000 a month.
“That is excluding the drugs. I spend about N20,000 on her drugs every
month. That is N500,000 that is needed per month to keep her alive. And
by the time she was admitted to the hospital the second time, all the
people that were there for us before had returned to their lives.“And I would never blame them. The country was in a recession and
everybody had their own problems too. People had to pay their children’s
school fees and so on. And this is not something an individual can take
up. I tried to get NGOs to help out but nothing was forthcoming.“Although, the ideal thing is for her to get dialysis three times a week
to make her active but I thought, with my salary and if I could get
some family members to support us, we could get her to have dialysis
sessions once in a week or twice in three weeks to sustain her since she
is retired from work.
“Initially, she could stay for three weeks without dialysis session but
it got worse and if she didn’t have it at least once a week, she would
start throwing up and purging. Then I realised it had gone past me. I
have been struggling and striving since March all alone to keep her
alive. If I don’t plan towards having a transplant as soon as possible, I
don’t know what will happen.”Adebimpe has been advised by doctors at the private hospital her mother is using to take her to India for kidney transplant.She said, “It will cost us between N8m to N12m to get the transplant
done in India. But that is just for the transplant, by the time we add
other costs, it will run to N20m. Apart from the cost of the medical
procedure, we have to consider the cost of travelling for three people –
the patient, the caretaker and the donor.“Then we should consider the cost of staying there for about three
months because after the transplant, she will be required to stay there
for about three months for close monitoring. And I understand that there
are expensive drugs that she will have to take to ensure that her body
does not reject the new organ. When you add all of this to the cost of
feeding, it will run into N20m.
“I checked the cost of doing transplant in the United States which is
about $200,000, so I realised that it is even better to go to India.
“It has been a traumatic experience for me. But it has also made me a
very strong person because I cannot cry whenever I am with her. I have
to be bold and keep all the pains inside. So the painful part is that I
cannot express what I feel so that my mother won’t break down. When she
is in pain, sometimes, she cries like a baby. I don’t want to lose my
mother. She is a good mother, who has been there for me.
“There is a day I would never forget. We ordered a taxi on Uber to take
us home from the hospital after my mother had a dialysis session. As the
nurse was wheeling her out, the Uber driver arrived, saw her and
reversed the vehicle immediately. He left and cancelled the appointment.
I felt bad. I cannot even imagine how my mother would have felt.”
Donations should be sent to Zenith Bank, Adebimpe Dipe, 2003846522
No comments:
Post a Comment