LIVE LUNG LOBE DONOR NEEDED TO SAVE LOCAL WOMAN'S LIFE

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“She is still the light of her Mom’s light…sunshine in the face of darkness.” – Facebook page posted by Katrina’s family

March 7, 2011 (Escondido) – Suzanne Stewart Pohlman, executive director of Interfaith Community Services in Escondido, has issued an urgent plea for a live donor willing to donate a lobe from a lung to save her daughter, Katrina "Katie" Howell. Katie lost her younger sister, Amanda, to cystic fibrosis at age 8. Though she suffers from the same disease, Katie has survived into adulthood; she is married and a college graduate. But now, she needs a live lung lobe donor immediately to live.
 

“The long term effects for the donors are minimal to none,” the cardiothoracic surgery center website for the University of Sothern California states.  Donors for Katie must be 18-55 years old with type A+ blood, in good health, life-long non-smokers, 5 feet 8 inches or taller.

If you or someone you know might be willing to be a donor, contact Suzanne’s husband, John Pohlman at 760-579-8275.
 

“I praise God daily that I am alive and experience all its possibilities, good and bad,” Katie once stated, according to Breathing Room: The Art of Living with Cystic Fibrosis.
 

For more information on becoming a live lung lobe donor, visit http://www.cts.usc.edu/livingrelatedlungtransplantation.html.
 

For more information on Katirina, visit a facebook page set up on her transplant need and see http://www.thebreathingroom.org/cr/kb01 .
 

East County Magazine gives permission for other publications, news organizations and websites to freely republish this article in its entirety and forward to anyone who may be able to help Katrina.
 


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