Sam Uzzell
Daniel's Liver Journey raising money for (PSC - Support)
Fundraising for PSC - Support
Story
Daniel's Liver Journey
I've decided to open this page to raise awareness and support for people living with PSC (especially children). If I can raise just £1 that will help someone else or help the organisation PSC support then I will feel my Journey is worthwhile. Hopefully we manage abit more than that.
I'm 32 and was diagnosed with PSC in 2011, my disease has progressed strongly this year and started to show signs of me needing to have a transplant. In November 2013 I was admitted to hospital with very severe symptoms and spent 6 weeks over christmas in care. I was released a few days before christmas thank God and placed on the Liver transplant list January 2014. With my blood group I may wait up to 18 months I have be advised and at this point I have been on the list for 5 months.
Its a hard Journey but its a Journey that does have an end destination and through it I have met so many people I would have never met in ordinary life.
After the whole feeling sorry for myself stuff I've decided to try and join the growing army of fund raisers, disease awareness campaigners, family, friends and loved ones of those who have been unfortunate to lose there battle and try to help others. Those suffering now and future sufferers.
I am doing so by raising money for PSC support a group of volunteers who work tirelessly to help others.
ABOUT PSC SUPPORT?There’s so little help for research and PSC sufferers and that’s where PSC Support comes in. PSC Support is a charity, totally run by volunteers, that helps people affected by PSC, including sufferers themselves, and their families. Your donation to PSC Support will make a real difference and will help provide information and support to those affected by PSC, promote PSC and organ donation awareness and develop effective partnerships with those involved with treatment and vitally needed research into PSC. Please look at our web site for more information. So please dig deep and donate now, any contribution will be gratefully received.
PSC (Primary Sclerosing Cholangitis)?
PSC is a rare Liver disease that has no known cause, cure or treatment. It causes the bile ducts both inside and outside the liver to become scarred, narrowed and eventually blocked. As more ducts become blocked, bile becomes trapped and damages the liver, leading to cirrhosis and liver failure. Symptoms along the way can often include:
• Chronic, debilitating fatigue
• Severe, uncontrollable itching
• Dangerous infections of the bile ducts
• Pain in the body’s Upper Right Quadrant
• Jaundice
The mechanisms of PSC are not clearly understood but it is definitely not caused by alcohol or other “lifestyle choices”. Current evidence suggests it is a combination of genetics, the immune system and some sort of trigger. PSC sufferers often have associated autoimmune diseases, most commonly inflammatory bowel diseases such as Crohn’s Disease or Ulcerative Colitis. As well as all that they also have a significant increase in the risks of bowel, liver and pancreatic cancers. Basically, you just don’t want to get PSC.
I have learnt so much about the Liver in the last 5 months more than I've learnt in a lifetime prior and believe in the future Liver disease will be a thing of the past if we all work together to do our bit.
WHAT CAN YOU DO TO HELP?
• Sponsor me through Just Giving web site or using the text message service
• Think about organ donation and if you do decide to sign the register, discuss with your family so they know your wishes
• Post your support for PSC Support group, Children's Liver Disease Foundation and British Liver Trust on my Facebook page.
• Post ideas of challenges I can undertake with friends and family.LIVING DONORS?
There is also a living donor option which is when someone living donates the right side of there liver to a patient. The liver is made up of two sides the left and right side and is the only organ that can regenerate itself fully.
This means the remaining left side within the living donor and the new right side that would now have been transplanted into the patient would grow back fully into full size livers within 8 weeks.
With a living donor there blood group has to match the patient and they would have to be a family member or friend of the patient.
Thank you for your time in reading my story and please donate whatever you can to help others.
Hey thankfully I received a liver transplant on 28.1.15 and I'm doing well. Let total wait time was 365 days exactly and my total hospital recovery time was 28 days.
My new liver was split in two and half was given to me and half was given to a 9 year old boy. God is good and I'd like to give a special Thankyou to the donar and his family for given us a second chance. Words can't describe the magnitude of what has been done for me.
We still have many others that are waiting and many others that will be in future and so our journey has only jus begun.
"I thank God for protecting me from what I thought I wanted and blessing me with what I didn't know I needed"
Dan