Local man searching for kidney donation

Posted 1/29/15

So, when he began experiencing problems emptying his bladder five or six years ago, he tried natural treatments to deal with his prostate problems instead of seeking medical help.

Unfortunately, that strategy came with a high price. He found …

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Local man searching for kidney donation

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As a child, Marc Beaudry of Powell had some “really bad experiences” in a hospital, and that created an aversion to hospitals and doctors for him.

So, when he began experiencing problems emptying his bladder five or six years ago, he tried natural treatments to deal with his prostate problems instead of seeking medical help.

Unfortunately, that strategy came with a high price. He found himself in Powell Valley Hospital on Oct. 9, 2013, with kidney failure.

“I took myself in for a blood test at the insistance of my wife,” he said. “They put me immediately into the hospital.”

Beaudry was weak and shaky, his heart was racing and he felt very cold. “I couldn’t walk a block without becoming breathless,” he said.

At the hospital, among other things, he received a transfusion of two units of packed red blood cells.

“When the kidneys fail, they no longer produce erythropoietin, and that is responsible for stimulating the bone marrow to produce red blood cells,” he said. “I had become extremely anemic.”

Beaudry said he later was told he had been within 48 hours of death. A catheter relieved the backlog of urine in his bladder.

“I had been holding a gallon and a half” of urine, he said. “I lost 10 pounds with the insertion of a catheter.”

He also underwent surgery to correct his prostate uropathy, and additional surgery later to remove a tumor from his bladder. While his kidney function improved somewhat, his doctor informed him eight months later that his kidneys were irreparably damaged.

In December, he completed the six-month testing process necessary to be placed on the national transplant list. Now, “I’m looking for a kidney,” he said Sunday.

Beaudry’s kidney function now has dropped to 4 percent, and he began dialysis at the Billings Clinic this week.

“At this point, since I don’t have a donor, I don’t have a choice,” he said Sunday. “I’m close to not functioning.”

Prior to traveling to Billings on Sunday, his hands shook, and he had difficulty using the touch screen on his cell phone accurately. Beaudry, who owns Mountain West Computer and Office Supply, said he was unable to use a computer keyboard — something he has done for decades.

“Thirty years on a cotton-pickin’ computer, and I can’t type a word,” he said.

Beaudry will stay in Billings for two weeks to receive training on a new form of dialysis that will allow him to do the dialysis at home.

“This is peritoneal dialysis, not hemodialysis,” he said.

Hemodialysis uses a fistula in a patient’s arm to send a patient’s blood through a dialysis machine, then back into his or her body. The procedure lasts for three hours, three times per week.

Peritoneal dialysis uses two tubes in the abdomen — one higher in the abdomen, the other low in his pelvis — to exchange fluid in the peritoneal cavity.

“It uses the peritoneal membrane as a replacement for the kidney,” Beaudry said. “It acts like an osmosis process between the membrane and fluid in your body.”

Four fluid exchanges are required each day.

“Hemodialysis is pretty hard on the body, and it has some recovery time,” Beaudry said. “With this, you won’t have that.”

But there is a significant risk of peritoneal infection, which can be life-threatening.

“That’s the reason for two weeks of training,” he said. 

Beaudry’s wife, Sherry, said she has been cleaning the room in the couple’s Powell home where Beaudry will do his dialysis procedure. In addition to washing walls and cleaning all surfaces, she is washing curtains and window coverings.

Beaudry had surgery in Denver last month to put the tubes in his abdomen.

Sherry said the dialysis treatments are working, and Marc has lost a significant amount of fluid that his body had been retaining.

She said he has been doing research about changes he will have to make in his diet, and he will talk to a dietician before he leaves Billings.

“He has to watch phosphorus and potassium,” she said.

In addition to the physical problems Marc Beaudry has experienced, the Beaudrys are feeling the financial strain that accompanies such serious medical issues. But, thanks to the Affordable Care Act, it isn’t as bad as it could have been.

“We’ve had Obamacare, if we want to call it that,” Marc Beaudry said, but the premiums are high. “We didn’t have insurance before Obamacare. I was ineligible for existing insurance. So, as anti-Obama as I am, Obamacare has been there for this situation.”

Still, it doesn’t cover travel to Denver or Billings, and it doesn’t cover housing for Sherry and for him when he’s not hospitalized.

Insurance will cover all medical costs for a kidney donor, but it won’t pay for travel or housing in Denver, or for a “significant other” who might want to accompany the donor.

However, expenses for a donor might be paid by the Living Donor Assistance Program, which aims to reduce financial disincentives to living organ donation.

There is an unexpected upside to Beaudry’s story. With all the medical procedures he has had in the last 15 months, Beaudry said he’s lost his fear of hospitals.

“I’m done with that,” he said. “I’ve had incredible care at the Powell hospital and incredible care from my Billings specialists.

“It distresses me greatly to hear that people won’t use our hospital,” Beaudry said. “They’re very good.”

Marc Beaudry of Powell is looking for a kidney donor.

While he’s on the national transplant list, waiting for a kidney donor to come up on the list takes an average of six years, Beaudry said. But if people are willing to be tested for compatibility especially for him, “that can happen within 90 days,” he said.

Anyone with blood type O could be tested.

To arrange for compatibility testing, contact the Transplant Center at Porter Hospital in Denver at 303-778-5797.

An account will be set up soon at First Bank of Wyoming for those who wish to help the Beaudrys with their financial needs.

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