Help Baby Mara's Liver Transplant

Amara Clarisse S. Medina, or Mara, as we call her is the second daughter of my highschool friends Carmina Sismaet-Medina and AJ Medina in Cavite, Philippines.

Baby Mara is now 4 months old and was diagnosed with Biliary atresia. She was operated last March 14 at Philippine General Hospital (PGH) in Manila, Philippines when she was just 2 months old. She had undergone a Kasai procedure where in her small intestine was directly connected to her liver because of the absence of her biliary duct. The operation went well and she recovered without any complications. Thank God! However, the major basis if the Kasai was successful are total elimination of jaundice and bright poops within 2-month post operation. Two of the basis that Mara unfortunately didn’t achieve. Carmina and AJ were advised by her doctor to give her additional medicine, phenobarbital, to reduce her jaundice and delay transplant a bit longer or when she is a bit older. But if this medicine doesn’t work then what’s left for them is for her to undergo liver transplant before 1 year of age or after she completed all her vaccines.

Carmina and AJ are aiming Taiwan for the transplant because of the high success rate, 0 donor mortality, and they are really good in handling rejection cases (very common that the baby will initially reject her new liver). Transplant alone will cost them $100,000 or around 5 Million Pesos. They have 2 Million Pesos on hand but with all the other miscellaneous and tests like the donor screening (more than 50K) and medicines and after monitoring, they know what they have is barely enough.

That is why we are humbly asking your generous hearts for any kind of help that you can extend. We believe in miracles but we also have to face the reality that if Liver Transplant will be the only option, we want to start now and raise the necessary fund to give Mara the best fight to live since we are battling against time.

We will be forever grateful for any help you can give and more than anything else we fervently ask for your prayers for Mara and Carmina and AJ’s family. We still hold strong to God’s promise that He will not abandon us and we are not alone in this battle. God bless us all!



Two-month old Baby Mara after Kasai procedure/operation at Philippine General Hospital (PGH) in Manila, Philippines.