Helping has become addicting, at least for former world karate champion Julian Chees who, last week, sent 200 Euros, his latest remittance to help the sick and needy in the Cordillera cope with the fund requirements of their healing.
The amount will be for the orphaned family of mine worker Romeo Garcia, a year old employee of Lepanto Mines in Benguet who recently lost his wife to kidney disease, leaving him with two young daughters also needing immediate medical attention.
Garcia was released from a hospital here last week after he was taken ill a few days after he buried his wife Jane (nee Lamlamang) who succumbed to kidney failure after deciding to quit her twice-a-week, lifetime dialysis that depleted the family resources.
The support amount sent by Chees from his base in Germany will be used for the medical battles of the mine laborer’s two children – Princess Arcia, 6, who is fighting leukemia, and Cathy Sy, 4, who was diagnosed for epilepsy.
The two toddlers were familiar figures at the dialysis room of the Baguio General Hospital and Medical Center, accompanying their mother to her dialysis schedule while their father was trying to earn to be able to cope with the fund requirements of his ailing family.
From his own hospital bed, Romeo recalled that his wife decided last December 2 to stop her life-time dialysis and return home to Lepanto. She died last Dec. 21, after which her husband brought her remains for burial in Bauko, Mtn. Province.
“Kunak kaniana nga kaya mi met pay nga gastusan to panag-agas na ngem imbagana nga nabannog unayen ken kayat nan ti agawid (I told her we could still sustain her treatment but she said she was already too tired and wanted to go home),” Romeo said.
She was the latest among a growing number of dialysis patients who decided to stop their life-time dialysis to relieve their families of the gnawing and constant pressure over where to go to sustain their treatment.
Earlier, another patient, Bryan Kelley Becaca of Loacan, Itogon, Benguet, almost died after he skipped two succeeding dialysis sessions, unable to cope with the financial requirements of the life-saving blood-cleansing procedure.
As a result, he became weak and had to be hospitalized for respiratory edema or having too much liquid in the lungs that should have been removed by dialysis. His sister was pumping an ambu-bag to help him breathe while he was undergoing emergency dialysis.
As a result, Samaritans responded to the pleas for help of the families. a retired anthropology professor deposited P5,000 with the hospital staff while a bookseller added P2,200. Sen. Paolo Benigno Aquino provided for two dialysis sessions.
Senator Aquino also set aside P5,000 medical support for Garcia’s children.
These cases again bring to the fore the need for government to pool its resources and to subsidize the cost of dialysis, given its nature as a life-saving procedure.
Towards this end, the Baguio Correspondents and Broadcasters Club, in coordination with patients and medical practitioners here, launched a signature campaign towards making dialysis a free medical procedure, as is being done in the United States and other countries.**
Ramon Dacawi
