Several years ago, Elaine began to have a hard time breathing she began coughing more and more and sometimes couldn’t get it under control. For many months she thought maybe it was her Lupus acting up, or a cold she couldn’t shake. When she went to see her doctor to see what was going on, she was told she had lung disease. She walked away with a few prescriptions and an order to follow up in a few weeks if she didn’t improve. She would have good days and bad days and when it was hot and humid outside, or extremely cold her breathing would get worse, and she would relapse into severe coughing fits. She didn’t know where to turn. After several years of prescriptions, inhalers, nebulizers and no answers, Elaine decided to get a second opinion.

She was referred to the University of Rochester Pulmonary group. That’s when she was diagnosed with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF). IPF is a type of lung disease that results in scarring of the lungs for an unknown reason. It is a serious condition that affects breathing and oxygen intake. The family was shocked. They thought lung disease only affected smokers or people who worked in extraneous environments that wasn’t Elaine‘s case at all. She worked a few years at Kodak, but devoted the rest of her years of taking care of her husband of 40+ years her six grandchildren and volunteering when she felt well. The diagnosis Elaine received that day was life-changing her life expectancy had changed. They told Elaine she didn’t have long to live without a double lung transplant.

Elaine then went with her family to the Cleveland clinic for another opinion and to learn more about her options. The clinic doctors told her that given her condition, she may be a candidate for a long transplant. Not the news they were hoping for, but it did offer a glimmer of hope for a better future. Visits to Cleveland for testing daily phone calls, and doctors appointments. Keep her busy right now. She’s oxygen dependent so it’s not easy to travel for 4 hours to get to the clinic or even get on a phone call with doctors and nurses without having a coughing fit that will exhaust her by the end of the call.

Elaine’s time now is occupied by resting to keep her strength and trying to breathe easy when she does even the littlest daily activity.

Now that Elaine keeps moving into the right direction and is now approved for a double lung transplant, that’s just the first step in her journey towards recovery. If and when she is chosen to have the surgery, the expenses of Elaine’s husband being out of work traveling to Ohio living at the clinic for possibly up to six months following the surgery and the therapy and possible home healthcare she will need once she returns home are going to be extenuating for her family.

As Elaine prepares for this long journey, her family is asking for your help to ease the financial burden they’re facing as a family, so Elaine can have the chance to live her life as fully as possible and enjoy her later years in life with her loved ones.