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And so it begins

At my last appointment, the nephrologist actually offered to give me a referral for transplant. And then a week later I got THIS in the mail from my insurance company.

Crap! It's getting real now.

If something like that doesn't take the wind out of your sails, I don't know what will.

Granted I had let my doctor know a couple of months ago that I wanted to be screened and ready to go as soon as my eGFR hit 20. Did I think it would be this year? No. My estimates were three years from now.

Yet the combination of the four point eGFR drop + the transplant referral leads me to believe that my DOCTOR believes I should hit 20 within the year.

I don't think I'm going to be able to last until the artificial kidney comes out. :-(




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Artificial kidney

I have a somewhat fanciful thought of what an artificial kidney would look like. I see a device that is shaped like a kidney (of course) but is completely clear so you could see all the blood circulating through it. Granted, once it's implanted no one's going to see it but - hey - it's my vision. The closest picture I can find of what's in my mind's eye is this image. Granted, that's a picture of a kidney-shaped paper weight and it's a little cloudy, but I know you can picture it too. My, oh my. My imagination is not even close to reality. According to a post from the American Journal of Kidney Diseases , there are three new approaches being explored right now: the automated wearable artificial kidney ('AWAK'), the wearable artificial kidney ('WAK') and the implantable artificial kidney ('IAK'). My money's on the IAK and you'll understand why once I show you the concept pictures of the other two. The AWAK is said to ...

Live in the moment

I'm a thinker, a what if-er. I analyze things to within an inch of their life. Live in the moment? What's that? Nothing is straight forward with PKD. The unpredictable nature makes it impossible to create solid plans. And the decisions you think you can make are often conflicting. Case in point, Tolvaptan. Taking it should slow down kidney decline, delaying my need for dialysis and/or transplant. Yet the older I am before I need a transplant, the higher my Expected Post Transplant Survival score is (a lower score means greater survival rate and, if 20 or less, a high quality kidney). But I'm really hoping to stave off dialysis/transplant until there's a viable implantable artificial kidney. See what I mean? I guess the bottom line is that I have to have faith and trust that whatever happens was meant to be. What are the words from the Serenity Prayer? God grant me the SERENITY to accept the thing I cannot change, the COURAGE to change the things I can and ...