Help get Kelsey health answers
Donation protected
For over 15 years Kelsey has been struggling with back pain. At a young age of 22 years old, she has lost most of her quality of life & lives everyday with chronic back pain. She was born prematurely and has struggled since birth with her severe hyper mobility.
About a year and a half ago, the pain became unmanageable. She went to a few spine specialists & went through rounds of spinal epidural injections, physical therapy, and many more tests. December 2017 she was managing a coffee stand, still experiencing her back pain. Her hips started to go out of place as well and she would fall over all the time, yet she still never took a day off work for it. She went back to the doctor and found out she had spondylislothesis & two pars fractures at her L5S1 level. February 2018 she went in for major back surgery. The surgery consisted of them going through her stomach to preform a diskectomy, put in a 20 mm cage, and a plate. Then, proceeded to flip her over and go in through her back and put in four screws & two rods. Because of insurance she was forced to leave the hospital less than 48 hours after surgery, even hardly being able to get out of bed on her own. One week after surgery she ended up back in the ER being severely allergic to all of her pain medication, and covered head to toe in hives. Recovery was supposed to be a few weeks AT LEAST, but if you know Kelsey you know she doesn’t skip a beat. She went back to work less than 6 days after. She lived alone and could not afford her bills without.
Throughout the next few months she continued complaining of back pain and not getting any better. More MRI’s were done and we found out her t5 was fractured in her back too and she had a bulged disc in her neck. She was sent to a pain management doctor to try to get some relief. In July 2018, Someone had then suggested she tested her bones, as it was not normal to have this many issues and fractures at the young age of 22. The doctor ordered a DEXA scan & sure enough she came back with -2.6 bone denisty in her spine. That means she had 26% less bone density than the average 30 year old. She was officially diagnosed with severe osteoporosis. Now, she was referred to an endocrinologist and internist in Spokane, WA. We’ve had quite a few different scares as she’s been in the ER for pain a few times, and with that she found out her scoliosis has doubled in one month and she had lost an inch and a half of height. She was put on a medicine called Forteo to build bone growth, in the form of a daily injection. The doctors in Spokane believed she has an underlying bone disease, and referred her to the University of Washington. As we were waiting for insurance to authorize that, she went in for another dexa scan last week, October 10th, 2018, and she had lost another 3% bone density and was now sitting at -2.9% for her bone density. We knew there was a huge problem and we needed to act fast. We looked into the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, AZ and decided that we were taking matters into our own hands.
We bought one way airplane tickets to AZ leaving 6 days later. We landed here late Tuesday night and have had non stop testing and appointments since.
Kelsey has continued work through this whole situation and tries her best to support herself, but because this has been so much expense out of pocket the majority has fallen on me. This has been a very rough year financially for her and i, and now I’ve resorted to putting everything on my credit cards.
We thought we would be leaving today to go back home, but the doctors are wanting to do more tests. Down here at the Mayo Clinic she is seeing.. a neurosurgeon, an endocrinologist, physical medicine and rehabilitation doctor, a geneticist, and a rhuemotologist. The rhuemotologist can’t get her in right away so she’s going to need to fly back down here AGAIN in December.
Every appointment she has been to the last year has been an expense, hospital bills, airplane tickets, hotel for two weeks, rental car, and Kelsey and I are both currently having to take off work to be here in AZ for a couple weeks.. we would be so appreciative of any help at all
About a year and a half ago, the pain became unmanageable. She went to a few spine specialists & went through rounds of spinal epidural injections, physical therapy, and many more tests. December 2017 she was managing a coffee stand, still experiencing her back pain. Her hips started to go out of place as well and she would fall over all the time, yet she still never took a day off work for it. She went back to the doctor and found out she had spondylislothesis & two pars fractures at her L5S1 level. February 2018 she went in for major back surgery. The surgery consisted of them going through her stomach to preform a diskectomy, put in a 20 mm cage, and a plate. Then, proceeded to flip her over and go in through her back and put in four screws & two rods. Because of insurance she was forced to leave the hospital less than 48 hours after surgery, even hardly being able to get out of bed on her own. One week after surgery she ended up back in the ER being severely allergic to all of her pain medication, and covered head to toe in hives. Recovery was supposed to be a few weeks AT LEAST, but if you know Kelsey you know she doesn’t skip a beat. She went back to work less than 6 days after. She lived alone and could not afford her bills without.
Throughout the next few months she continued complaining of back pain and not getting any better. More MRI’s were done and we found out her t5 was fractured in her back too and she had a bulged disc in her neck. She was sent to a pain management doctor to try to get some relief. In July 2018, Someone had then suggested she tested her bones, as it was not normal to have this many issues and fractures at the young age of 22. The doctor ordered a DEXA scan & sure enough she came back with -2.6 bone denisty in her spine. That means she had 26% less bone density than the average 30 year old. She was officially diagnosed with severe osteoporosis. Now, she was referred to an endocrinologist and internist in Spokane, WA. We’ve had quite a few different scares as she’s been in the ER for pain a few times, and with that she found out her scoliosis has doubled in one month and she had lost an inch and a half of height. She was put on a medicine called Forteo to build bone growth, in the form of a daily injection. The doctors in Spokane believed she has an underlying bone disease, and referred her to the University of Washington. As we were waiting for insurance to authorize that, she went in for another dexa scan last week, October 10th, 2018, and she had lost another 3% bone density and was now sitting at -2.9% for her bone density. We knew there was a huge problem and we needed to act fast. We looked into the Mayo Clinic in Scottsdale, AZ and decided that we were taking matters into our own hands.
We bought one way airplane tickets to AZ leaving 6 days later. We landed here late Tuesday night and have had non stop testing and appointments since.
Kelsey has continued work through this whole situation and tries her best to support herself, but because this has been so much expense out of pocket the majority has fallen on me. This has been a very rough year financially for her and i, and now I’ve resorted to putting everything on my credit cards.
We thought we would be leaving today to go back home, but the doctors are wanting to do more tests. Down here at the Mayo Clinic she is seeing.. a neurosurgeon, an endocrinologist, physical medicine and rehabilitation doctor, a geneticist, and a rhuemotologist. The rhuemotologist can’t get her in right away so she’s going to need to fly back down here AGAIN in December.
Every appointment she has been to the last year has been an expense, hospital bills, airplane tickets, hotel for two weeks, rental car, and Kelsey and I are both currently having to take off work to be here in AZ for a couple weeks.. we would be so appreciative of any help at all
Organizer and beneficiary
Debra Wesbrook
Organizer
Hayden, ID
Kelsey Creamer
Beneficiary