Everyone has a cause or causes that are close to their heart. Some of the more common awareness weeks or months you see are Breast Cancer, Autism, Heart diease, Diabetes and Multiple Sclerosis. I myself have done bike rides and walks over the years to support many different causes. But in the 5+ years since my bowel resection that left me with very little small bowel and an ileostomy, my passion is to help those with Short Bowel Syndrome, TPN Dependency and ostomies feel like they are not alone in coming to terms with the changes in their life and how to cope..
Every year the first week of August is HPN Awareness week to raise awareness for those on Home Parenteral Nutrition (HPN) also known as TPN (Total Parenteral Nutrition). In the 1960's after watcing several patients die after succesful bowel surgery, Dr, Stanley Dudrick began working on an idea of how to feed those who couldn't eat by mouth. He developed a nutrition compound that could be infused through a vein and raised beagle puppies for 287 days on TPN. That led to trying it on 6 patients successfully in 1966. Since then thousands of people have used HPN to survive and live, newborns, childrend and adults included. There have been children that have grown up on Dr. Dudrick's invention.
I know that I would not be where I am today without living on TPN for 2.5 years. During those early years, I was unable to eat enough calories to recover from surgery, gain weight or strength to live. I owe my life to Dr. Dudrick, the early beagles and all the early patients on TPN. Without all them, we would not have the medical & scientific advances to help people with intestinal failure to keep living.
Thank you Dr. Dudrick for keeping me and many others alive to Live, Love and Laugh again!
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| Dr. Dudrick and one of his beagles. |
