Support Katie's Battle with Multiple Hip Replacements

This GoFundMe is to help with medical bills as the past 6-7 months have drained every resource we have had to help pay for my mom's medical bills. Monthly bills have started to become difficult to cover as well as more medical tests and expenses keep arising, so anything that you can donate to help us with the bills related to her past surguries and going on 6th and 7th hip replacements and hospital stays are extremely appreciated. Below is her full story for anyone interested in seeing the full timeline of what has been going on. My mom Katie is truly the strongest person I have ever met, and I would love to be able to help her offset some or most of the costs that have come with this experience.

On October 7th, 2024, Katie had her first hip replacement on her left hip that also included a ligament repair. After paying over $3500 for different aspects of the replacement, Katie had met her deductible for her insurance, which was the only positive we could joke about at the time. She was in extreme pain afterwards but continued to work on walking independently and strengthening her leg again so that she would be able to walk properly while still in pain. On November 22rd, she dislocated her left hip while sitting on the couch and adjusting her toes to get more comfortable. Katie had to go to the emergency room where they had to perform a closed reduction as the ball was stuck under her socket.

Katie had her 2nd hip replacement on her left hip on December 4, 2024. When they cut her incision open, fluid poured out of the hip, which we were later told was an infection in the area. She received a dual mobility replacement so that the joint had more flexibility to prevent future dislocations.

On December 12th, in the middle of recovering from the 2nd surgery, Katie received notice that her job was terminated, and she was forced to leave the company she had worked for for 24 years. Her medical insurance now expired on January 31, 2025. She and her doctor decided to replace her right hip before her insurance ended so that she didn’t have to pay $3500 again. Both were comfortable with this decision, and the doctor stated he would use the dual mobility replacement as to not run the risk of dislocation like the left hip.

On January 10, 2025, Katie received her 3rd hip replacement, the first one on her right hip. On January 20th, her incision started to open and began leaking blood and yellowish clear fluid. As no one was to move in Pensacola unless it was an emergency due to the snow storm, Katie decided to stay home until the roads were officially opened on January 23rd. She didn’t want to put others in danger to get her to the hospital…

At the emergency room on the 23rd, she had a high fever and very low blood pressure and was very lethargic and pale. She was diagnosed with septic arthritis and needed to be treated immediately. She met with her surgeon on the 24th, who said she had have her 4th replacement on January 27th.

Katie was admitted to West Florida on the 26th to receive antibiotics before surgery and did have her 4th replacement (2nd one on the right hip) on the 27th. Due to the septic arthritis, her surgeon used a traditional hip replacement as he did not want to run the risk of the infection getting into the new replacement. They had to clean the area 5 times and take out tissue in several parts of her hip area.

This was the worst surgery Katie had been through. She had to stay in the hospital for 4 days to be monitored while her infection was inspected so that she received the necessary antibiotics and other medical assistance after the surgery. Katie was not comfortable with the new replacement, but her surgeon said this replacement would not dislocate. When she was released on January 30th, she was sent home on a PICC line for her antibiotics and several other prescriptions. Her PICC line had to be cleaned every week with labs pulled and new antibiotics sent out afterwards to ensure she was properly treated, which lasted for 7 weeks.

On March 16th, Katie's right hip dislocated, which required an ambulance to rush her to the hospital so that it could be put back in place with a closed reduction. She only moved her toe to the side when she was sitting down, and once the hip was dislocated, it attempted to continuously dislocate when she would sit down moving forward. Due to this, hip replacement #5 was later scheduled for April 9th to put back in a dual mobility replacement.

On Wednesday, April 9th, Katie had the 5th replacement surgery and was sent home the same day as everything seemed to be going smoothly with this replacement. By Monday, April 14th, her incision was leaking blood at a continuous rate, to which a wound vac had to be placed on top of her incision to keep up with the rate of the wound leaking.

Everything appeared to be going well until Friday, April 25th, when Katie was admitted to the hospital for a low red blood cell count, which required her to receive 2 blood transfusions and stay 3 days to ensure her platelet count went back to normal levels. It was found that a large hematoma was below her incision, which her original ortho doctor did not have any major concerns about. During this visit, a different ortho doctor finally agreed to take over Katie's case as she couldn't trust her original doctor after everything kept going wrong.

Although she was discharged on Sunday, April 27th, she was readmitted to the hospital on Tuesday, April 29th. She had a fever of 101 and her incision and surrounding area was bright red and very hot. Her new ortho doctor believed she was septic once again. She was then readmitted to the hospital with the understanding that she wound have to have hip replacement #6 (now scheduled for May 2nd), where they would take out the current implant and put in a new regular one covered in antibiotics to help fight the infection. She will likely also have to have a PICC line put back in for daily antibiotics and weekly lab work to make sure the infection is not spreading again.

Eventually, in 3 months, Katie will have to have a 7th hip replacement to put back in the dual mobility implant as the past regular implants have continuously dislocated.

At this point, my mom is looking at a total of 2 hip replacements on the left hip and 5 on the right hip. She has had 3 different insurances during this time, so we are not sure what is covered and what is not any more due to the amount of time needed to process the paperwork and request different entities file with the correct insurance for that time period. Again, any thing you can donate it greatly appreciated: even a dollar is more than what we would have without your support.