Жительница Тамаквы чудом выжила после отказа печени благодаря самоотверженному донору

TAMAQUA – In October 2021, Jean Paslawsky took a tumble on the sidewalk in front of her house in the borough’s South Ward. Her injuries were severe enough to warrant a trip to the emergency room at St. Luke’s Hospital-Miners Campus in Coaldale. “I was sore all over,” recalled Jean, 65, who is a retired telecommunications consultant. At a chance meeting with her family physician, Dr. Cristin A. Weicker, Jean complained that her stomach was distended and legs swollen. Under Weicker’s care, Jean underwent a battery of tests at Lehigh Valley Hospital-Schuylkill in Pottsville. The eventual diagnosis, Weicker said, was that Jean should start thinking about a liver transplant. “I was in liver failure,” Jean said during a recent interview at her home. “I had no clue; it was unbelievable.” Unprepared for what happened next, she embarked on a yearlong journey that brought her face to face with her own mortality. Aside from debilitation, she had to deal with myriad tests and the emotional highs and lows of securing a donor, only to have it fall through for one reason or another. Then there was the nagging fear that a donor would not be found in time. Jean would discover strength she didn’t know she had, relying on her deep sense of spirituality to sustain her over the long haul. Friends formed prayer groups, while others selflessly came forward with offers of being a donor. Perhaps most incredibly of all, a Marine Corps veteran from 1,100 miles away in Florida would become her savior. Seeking a donor Almost immediately, Jean began looking for a donor. The liver is an extraordinary organ – the only one in the body that can regenerate itself. It almost sounds like something out of a sci-fi movie: Once a portion of a liver is removed from a living donor and transplanted, the liver regenerates in both the donor and the recipient. To increase her chances of having a healthy transplant, Jean wanted to find a hospital that worked with living donors. She settled on two: Thomas Jefferson University Hospital in Philadelphia and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center. Though she became increasingly aware that she had a life-threatening illness, Jean downplayed it with friends. Instead of going into detail, she’d tell them, say a Hail Mary for me. The word got out, however, that she needed a liver transplant. And it wasn’t long before she heard from an old classmate at Immaculata University, a woman who lives in Delaware. “She texted me and offered to donate part of her liver,” Jean said. Jean urged the friend to reconsider. Talk to your family, discuss it with your doctor, she said. “There was no telling her no,” Jean said. Tragically, during testing to determine if she could be a donor, doctors discovered that the woman had cancer. Getting sicker As is common with liver disease, the whites of Jean’s eyes turned yellow. And, as the disease progressed, she became increasingly unable to function normally. She had little saliva, and had to drink water to wash down her food. Her legs were so swollen she had to lift them with her hands when getting into a car. At times the bloating was so severe her stomach pushed against her diaphragm, making it difficult to breathe. And she could hardly climb the steps of her home to get to the bathroom. Three times she had to go to a hospital and have fluid pumped from her body. “I could literally see my stomach going down,” Jean said, describing the effects of the procedure. She found some relief in a lymphatic massage performed by therapist Melissa Manhart in Orwigsburg. Ups and downs At 3 a.m. on a day in early June 2022, a transplant coordinator from Thomas Jefferson University Hospital called. A patient who’d agreed to donate their organs was not doing well, and a liver might soon be available, the coordinator told a bleary-eyed Jean. She should get ready, the coordinator said, and the hospital would call back when the organ became available. Jean already had bags packed for an extended hospital stay. She got dressed and waited. Indeed, the call came a few hours later. “Can you come immediately,” the coordinator asked. “I can be there by noon,” Jean replied. Jean’s older sister, Joann Paslawsky, drove her to Philadelphia. They share the same home, where they grew up, and throughout her ordeal, Joann has been at her sister’s side. “My mother always used to say, ‘You only have each other, so take care of each other,’ ” said Joann, 71, a retired technical writer. Jean was being prepared for surgery at Jefferson when she was informed that the donor’s liver was not suitable for transplant. Not long after she returned home to Tamaqua, Jefferson called a second time. They had another donor, but there was a hitch. The donor had used illegal drugs, and might have been exposed to HIV. “I have to think about it, and I’ll call you back in five minutes,” Jean said. “I have to pray.” “God, please tell me what is the right thing to do,” she pleaded aloud. She returned Jefferson’s call and said, “I’m sorry, I can’t do this.” Marian class reunion Despite her condition, Jean was intent on attending the reunion of the Class of 1975 at Marian Catholic High School at Basile Italian Delight Restaurant over Labor Day weekend in 2022. Regretfully, she was simply too sick to attend. At the reunion, a classmate, Gina Curley, announced that Jean needed a liver transplant. Within days, Jean was contacted by Cassandra “Cassie” Moucheron, a Mahanoy City woman who volunteered to donate part of her liver. Cassie had intended to be a donor to her husband, Bobby, who needed liver and kidney transplants. She had undergone all the rigorous testing at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, and was an approved donor. For medical reasons, Bobby was unable to accept a portion of his wife’s liver. Jean accepted the offer, and made an appointment to undergo testing at Johns Hopkins on Sept. 24, 2022. As fate would have it, the next day UPMC called and said they had a donor and surgery could be performed on Oct. 17, 2022. Though eternally grateful, Jean turned down Cassie’s offer and went ahead with the surgery at UPMC. “I had waited so long, and God had found me a donor,” she recalls. “Like Moses, who had to wait for the sea to part, my sea parted and I was going through it.” Finally, a donor In 1990, when Saddam Hussein ordered Iraqi troops to invade Kuwait, Jeffrey C. Methena quit school at the University of Connecticut and joined the Marine Corps. He’d always believed it was his responsibility to help where help was needed. In this case, his country’s need outweighed his own need for an education. It was that strong sense of idealism that, 32 years later, underlay the 51-year-old Florida man’s decision to donate part of his liver to a friend’s stepmother. Jeff, a specialist in cybersecurity, initially thought his liver would be compatible with the recipient, a Connecticut woman. Tests revealed, however, that the donor and recipient’s blood types did not match. When approached by UPMC to participate in a paired exchange, a kind of organ swap, Jeff was only too eager to comply. The way it worked: Jeff would donate a portion of his liver to Jean. In return, UPMC would provide Jeff’s intended recipient with the transplant she needed. On Oct. 17, 2022, two donors and two recipients underwent surgery at the same time in the Pittsburgh hospital. ‘Hand of God’ Following organ donation protocol, UPMC did not inform Jean who her donor was, nor did they tell Jeff who had received part of his liver. In January of this year, Jean and Jeff were both scheduled for their three month checkups at UPMC. Though both were unaware of it, Jeff’s appointment was set for a week before Jean’s. On Jan. 11, the day of Jeff’s appointment in Pittsburgh, the Federal Aviation Administration grounded all flights in the U.S. due to an air traffic control problem. His appointment was rescheduled to Jan. 18, the day of Jean’s appointment. After both consented, they met for five or 10 minutes in the hospital. “I cried. I hugged him. I said, ‘God bless you,’ ” Jean said through tears. “I’m standing here because of your generosity.” For Jeff, seeing Jean healthy and happy was the fulfillment of his decision to become a donor. “It was so great to see her,” he said. “My biggest worry was that the transplant wouldn’t work.” Jean was not sure she’d ever meet her donor in person. And it might not have happened were it not for the nation’s air transportation system being shut down. It was symbolic, Jean says, of all the twists and turns she’d experienced since being informed she needed a liver transplant. “The hand of God has been all over this,” she said. “He’s been so good to me, it’s a miracle.” As a footnote, Jean Paslawsky, who’s feeling fine, is scheduled for her nine-month checkup next week at UPMC. Bobby Moucheron underwent a double transplant last year at Johns Hopkins and is doing fine. And Cassie Moucheron eventually donated 65% of her liver to an unknown recipient, also at Johns Hopkins, and is also doing fine.