Ella from Israel needs urgent lung transplant!!!!

Ella from Israel needs urgent lung transplant!!!!
This is a piece (in Hebrew) that was shown at Israeli Channel 2. You can find below the transcript in English (courtesy of Abigail Greif Kantorovich). Also, the daily updates about Ella's condition are at Ella's husband facebook: http://www.facebook.com/john.calculus

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Ella is a happy 27 year old, and next week she might die. That is the truth, and that is the grim reality of those on the long organ donor waiting list. Despite the rising public awareness, there are still very few donations.

Mother: You're strong. I promise you it will be OK.

Narrator: There is a lot of love around 27 year old Ella Pechony's bed. She has CF. She is unconscious and on an ECMO machine since her lungs collapsed, but her relatives believe she can hear them.

Mother: I promise you that you can come home, and you can do everything.

Ella has fought this terrible disease, which kills most patients before the age of 40, all her life. Fighting, and at the same time studying, getting married and succeeding at everything.

Narrator: Weren't you afraid of getting into arelationship with someone who might die young? John: Maybe. I was in love. I still am.

Ella's one chance of survival is a an urgent lung transplant from a deceased who agreed to donate his or her organs.

Prof. Mordechai Kremer, lung unit manager: She is in a very critical state. Her lungs do not function at all. We have about a week's window of opportunity in which, if a donor is found that will give his lungs, we can save her.

Narrator: And if that doesn't happen?

Prof: If that doesn't happen she will die.

Narrator: Do you think she'll win?

Doctor Blau, Lung and CF unit manager at Schneider Hospital: Yes. Narrator: But you're a bit teary eyed now.

Doctor Blau: I'm teary eyed because I know the clock is ticking.

Narrator: Dr. Jonathan Cohen and the devoted team at Beilinson Hospital's ICU are keeping Ella alive in the hope of finding a lung donor. The CF organization is outside, supporting the family. This is what these struggles really look like. And they far too often fail. 70 Israelis are currently waiting for a lung transplant. Unfortunately, about half of them will die, because there are not enough donors. The Israelis have a big heart and they love helping -- but they draw the line at organ donations. Only 11% of the population have signed organ-donor cards. Much less than in Europe.

Prof: People don't donate. They don't understand the importance of a donation. We don't have a solution for all these patients. If we had a lung ten days ago, this patient would not be in this situation.

Narrator: Before we left, we asked Ella's relatives if they wanted us to hide her face. They insisted we didn't, since it is important for them that we all understand that behind the sad statistics of organ donors in Israel are people who want to live.

Category:

Nonprofits & Activism

Tags:

• lung
• transplant
• CF
• israel
• cystic fibrosis

[bekah130885]

Love you, Lois. <3 Thinking of you always!!! xxxxxxxxx