In November 2019, my parents came to see me and my family with the intention of spending more time with my children. Their plan was to go back to India in October 2020, however, flights were cancelled due to the global pandemic, and they had to delay their return.

My father went on his usual stroll to the park on March 20th, 2021, and suffered a major cardiac arrest. He was fortunate enough to be noticed by a stranger who served as our guardian angel. My father's life was spared because of his timely and effective CPR. He received six electric shocks to resuscitate his heart, yet after he was put into a medical coma of six days since his heart had gotten so weak. His angiogram confirmed that there were multiple plaques in his coronary arteries.  He had triple vessel disease and extreme ventricular dysfunction, according to his diagnosis. The best way to save him was to get the bypass surgery.

Keeping in mind that he was not an Australian citizen we asked the doctors if he could go back home and get the surgery done there. The doctors advised me against this because it would put his health in jeopardy. His heart at the time had only 20% functionality.  It was not safe to do the invasive procedure on him at that time however it was the only option to save his life.

After many discussions with the doctors and surgeons, the operation was finally done. The Head surgeon said he has never operated on such a weak heart and the possibility of him coming out alive from the operation theatre after the surgery was very dim. The surgery was successful however after the procedure his heart function has become more weak and now it is only functioning at a 10% capacity. My dad is a fighter. With his strong will and positivity he is winning his day to day battle.

He is still not out of the woods yet. New complications keep occurring one after the other. But we all are positive and have strong faith that he will back to us safe and sound.

As we mentioned earlier he is not an Australian resident, and because of that he is not entitled to any medical benefits. Private insurance covers peanuts. The massive cost of his surgery , ICU stay both before and after the surgery, cost of medication, blood work, X-Rays, CT Scans, angiograms, ambulance , physiotherapy … to name a few things which have to be covered out of pocket. The daily cost of an ICU stay was $4800 and he was there for over 14 days. After that he was in the acute cardiac ward for few days which was another $1700 per day and of course his stay in the general ward was $1900 per day.

The current situation in India due to Covid-19 is not the greatest. His fragile health does not permit us to  send him back to recuperate.  Any assistance you can provide me, no matter how big or small will help me to cover some of the bills.

Thank you to all of you from the bottom of my heart and please continue keeping my dad in your prayers.