Source: santacruzsentinel

SAN LORENZO VALLEY

Family raising money for stem cell treatment

The family of a San Lorenzo Valley man paralyzed in a dirt biking accident last year is raising money to send their son, now 20, to China to undergo stem cell therapy.

Jerry MacCallister dreamed of becoming an astronaut, but is now a quadriplegic who has slowly regained limited use of his hands, according to his family. A new stem cell therapy that involves harvesting adult stem cells from the patient’s own body may help him make more of a recovery, but the treatment is not available in the United States. It also isn’t covered by insurance.

The cost of traveling to China, a one-month stay and the medical procedure is about $40,000. The MacCallister family is asking for donations to help fund the trip and treatment. To help, send checks to the Jerry MacCallister Assistance Fund, 162 McPheeters Circle, Boulder Creek, CA 95006 or go online to the family’s blog, www.followingjerry.com.

Source: Freep.com

Kaden Strek was born three months premature to a drug-addicted mother. Weighing 2 pounds, 12 ounces, he wasn’t expected to live.

If he did, he would be placed in an institution because of his disabilities, his adoptive mother, Eddie Strek, was told. He is blind, has limited speech, hydrocephalus (excessive fluid on the brain) and cerebral palsy.

But Strek, who learned she was pregnant with her first child two days before Kaden was born, wasn’t going to let him slip into the system.

“Sometimes you know it’s the right thing to do,” she said of the decision she and her husband, Tom Strek, made to adopt Kaden. They knew the boy’s mother.That decision was seven years, 15 surgeries and 29 therapists ago.

Now, the St. Clair Shores parents want to give Kaden a chance to see, speak and walk, through umbilical cord blood stem cell treatments that they said aren’t available in the U.S.

They are to hold a fund-raiser Sunday to pay for the treatments in China. Eddie Strek said the trip and the treatments, which would flood Kaden’s body with new cells to repair the damaged ones, are estimated to cost about $50,000. The family has about $20,000. Read the rest of this entry »

Source: Lapeer Area View

LAPEER — When Ashley Fuller’s first child, Johanvan, was born he was small. She had just turned 18. Other than being born with a severe case of jaundice she thought he looked just fine.

Months later, however, the crushing news came.

Her pediatrician sent her to a opthamologist and neurologist in Flint because Johnavan’s rapid eye movements were troubling. Read the rest of this entry »

Source: chealth.canoe.ca

Provided by: QMI
Written by: Eric Yvan Lemay, QMI Agency
May. 4, 2010

MONTREAL ­- Mia Couture suffers from a rare disease that has made her blind since birth. Her parents are willing to do whatever it takes to restore her vision and are planning to travel to China in a few weeks so she can get stem cell treatment.

There’s one problem: the 35-day treatment program will cost at least US$29,300. Add travel costs, meals and accommodations, and the total cost could be around US$40,000. Read the rest of this entry »

To learn about Joan, please read this introduction written by her husband.

Joan Dean is 59 years and she is from Morristown, TN. She and I have been married since May 2001.