This week has been a breath of fresh air!

Stephen began treatment on Monday and has already shown improvement. For a man who has spent most of the last year in the hospital, receiving the same treatment, the same food, and the same prognosis, coming here is definitely good for his soul. The therapy he is receiving here goes beyond anything we have witnessed back home.

Our family is very well acquainted with the hospital life and the typical protocol. To see how they individualize his treatment and his nutritional plan gives us hope that we are down the right path. In four days, the therapy has already helped him get off his pain and nausea medication which has allowed him to eat and walk around for the first time in weeks!

However, due to his condition, he was admitted as an inpatient (not an outpatient that we had budgeted for) and he has needed blood and platelets almost daily since we arrived. The doctors here were shocked that he was receiving transfusions back home at 70RBC; apparently in order for his heart to function effectively and for his organs to properly receive oxygen, he needs to be above 80RBC. He has been living with counts well below what is required for proper heart function over the past month!! The price tag for each bag of blood product is quite high here: $560 US for RBCs and a whopping $1000US for platelets. (Yikes).

Please continue to share this so that Stephen can go from having “no chance” to having “a fighting chance.”

Thank you so much for your continued support and prayers.