To Donate to Save Patrick’s Vision on Go Fund Me, Click Here!
We’re raffling off a catered lunch for up to 20 people (or a $100 gift card if you don’t want to share). $5/ticket or 5 tickets for $20. Tickets are available at Sublime, or you can call during business hours (574) 635-3299 and pay over the phone. All money will be donated to Patrick.
Winner will be drawn on September 20th. We will deliver up to half hour away. If someone doesn’t want a catered lunch, they can choose a $100 gift card instead. ☺️
More information from the Go Fund Me Page:
My 16 year old grandson Patrick was set to start his junior year of high school this week. He is a good student and a member of the high school football and basketball teams. On the afternoon of Saturday, August 3, Patrick was on the beach at Lake Michigan with a friend’s family, playing a makeshift game of baseball. One of the kids had a rubber ball and the boys found a used piece of plastic PVC pipe along the beach to use as a “bat.” One of the very first hits cracked the “bat,” and pieces of sharp plastic went flying. One of the shards of plastic sliced /tore off Patrick’s left eyelid which was laid completely open. A doctor and 2 nurses who were close by heard yelling and saw Patrick hit the ground. They got there quickly and held Patrick’s eyelid and eye together until the ambulance arrived. The EMTs transported Patrick to South Bend Memorial Hospital where surgery was immediately performed to reattach his eyelid. Pat’s eye itself was seriously damaged. Patrick’s vision in his left eye – which was his good eye before the accident – is completely gone and remains gone today. His vision in his right eye is mediocre. On Monday, Aug 5, Patrick , his mom, and me (his grandma) met with a hospital-affiliated ophthalmologist who told us that Pat needs several more surgeries by doctors more skilled and experienced than he is. The doctor immediately attempted to refer Patrick to a retina specialist that excels at treating traumatic eye injuries involving the retina. Sadly, the retina specialist declined to see Patrick because he doesn’t accept Patrick’s insurance (MHS). Pat was then referred to a different retina specialist that the doctor said would do a good job for Patrick. In what was a major blow to all of us, this second doctor also was unwilling to take on Patrick as a patient. Finally, the ophthalmologist was able to locate a retina specialist in Indianapolis who accepts Patrick’s insurance. While I don’t question the third retina specialist’s knowledge and skill in his area of expertise, he primarily focuses on retinal DISEASE, diabetes and age-related macular degeneration. He does not regularly deal with traumatic eye INJURIES which is of course what Patrick has. That is where my frustration first came in. Patrick needs a retina specialist who has experience working with severe eye injuries in young people. When we were first confronted with the reality that many of the best doctors for his injury would not take his insurance, we said “Okay, we will sell everything we can and put a second mortgage on the house.” We’d do whatever it takes to get him the best care. The reality is that getting a second mortgage takes about as much time as a first mortgage and involves completing all of the steps that a first mortgage does. We don’t have time for all of that. We lease both of our cars so we can’t sell those or even get rid of the payments until the rental period is over. On top of that, I couldn’t even get the first choice of the retina specialists to tell me how much money I had to come up with for him to consider taking Patrick on as a patient. We had little choice but to see this third retina specialist immediately. After examining Patrick’s eyes and doing an ultrasound on his left eye, the retinal specialist said (and I quote the doctor), “Everything that can be wrong with an eye is wrong with his eye.” One of the bones in his eye socket was cut out or “chiseled” off, his pupil has been torn apart resulting in a lot of blood remaining pooled in his eye, half of his iris is missing, he has a trauma induced cataract and his lens is detached and damaged. The vitreous “jelly” in his eye is herniated and creating problems. His retina is damaged and at least partially detached, perhaps completely detached. Patrick’s next surgery is Wednesday morning (August 14) in Indianapolis. It will be a vitrectomy and a lensectomy – to remove the eye jelly, most of the excess blood, the lens, and perhaps the cataract. The surgeon will attempt to flatten out the retina. Starting immediately after surgery, Patrick will have to lie flat on his stomach with his face pointed toward the floor for anywhere from as short as 2 weeks to as long as 6-8 weeks. The equipment required for keeping him in the correct position costs $189 a week to rent. This latest news means not only can Patrick not go to school, he will have a hard time completing any schoolwork at home. (He has been confined to bedrest since the surgery.) This current retina specialist is not hopeful that Patrick will ever have normal vision in his left eye. He said his goal is for Pat to be able to see well enough that if he should completely lose vision in his right eye, that he could navigate his way out of a room that was on fire and find the door, etc with his left eye because he said that at this point, he could not, he would just perish in the fire. (It was gruesome to hear it put like that.) He said there’s a chance that Patrick might not get ANY vision back in his eye. But when pushed, he did acknowledge the possibility that he (Doc) could be surprised and Pat could end up with better vision than he expects. We, his family, are aching to surprise the heck out of that doctor. We understand that within the next few months, Patrick will have to have an unknown number of surgeries on other parts of his eye, will require additional medical equipment, and will be prescribed various medications, some of which might not be covered by insurance. (Example: today we just paid $282.00 for a tiny tube of eye ointment that was not covered. It was the third of that kind that he’s needed since August 4.) Our hopes are that Patrick will henceforth be able to be referred to the best kind of eye specialist for each subsequent surgery regardless of what kind of insurance they take, that we can afford all of Patrick’s medications regardless of whether or not they are covered by Pat’s insurance, and that we can afford any specialized equipment that Patrick needs to help him recover and heal after his various operations. Our ultimate hope is that Patrick will regain his vision and be able to once again go to school and participate in the activities he loves. I have never asked for money before. I am told I must set a financial goal. To be honest, I have no idea how much we will need as we are just one week into what the specialists have told us will be a very long and very difficult process. The financial goal I am selecting could be just be the tip of the iceberg or it might be right on target. I apologize for not being more certain. I am going to have faith that some, and maybe even most, of these procedures will be at least partially covered by insurance. Any amount you donate will be much appreciated. If you are unable to make a financial donation, we just ask that you say a prayer for Patrick’s vision to be restored and for him to make a full recovery. Thank you very much.
