Fw: Love Your Liver: Aidan's Story

[Guest guest]

Jeanne

Subject: Love Your Liver: Aidan's StoryTo: jeanne2113@...Date: Tuesday, December 9, 2008, 5:00 PM

Dear Friend,

We are writing to you this Holiday Season to share a special story of healing with you and to ask you to give the gift of hope to over 30 million Americans who are currently battling liver disease.

In September 2007, Aidan Diederich celebrated his first birthday with all of his friends and family at a weekend carnival party. A few days later on a Tuesday, Aidan's parents and Jeff found out the wonderful news that was pregnant again with their second child. Happily, they went in to wake up Aidan to celebrate. What they found terrified them.

Aidan apparently had been vomiting; he was jaundiced and his skin was ashy. "I thought he was dead when I lifted him out of the crib," says Jeff, a firefighter and EMT. Aidan was rushed to the hospital, and then to the Cleveland Clinic Children's Hospital for more acute care. He was barely hanging on.

Within hours, and Jeff received the shocking news: Aidan was in acute liver failure. The cause was unknown and there were no previous symptoms. Aidan's doctors put him on the national transplant waiting list, but Aidan was running out of time.

By the next afternoon, on Wednesday, with no donor livers available, 12 family members and friends offered themselves as live donors. Working feverishly, Aidan's doctors reduced several weeks of testing to a mere eight hours. On Wednesday night, a miracle came through...'s 28-year-old brother Jeff was a match!

On Thursday morning, Uncle Jeff and Aidan made history as Cleveland Clinic's first emergency live liver donor transplant patients.

It has been over a year since Aidan's transplant and he is "a very happy, energetic and outgoing kid who loves everyone." For everyone who knows and loves Aidan, his life is a miracle.

As his parents -- and we at the American Liver Foundation -- know, however, Aidan also owes his life to the scientific discoveries that have improved diagnosis, transplantation and post-transplant care.

ALF is the largest, non-governmental funder of liver research here in the U.S. And with the federal government freezing medical research budgets over the past few years, our investment is even more crucial.

That gives people like the Diederichs tremendous hope -- for their own son, as well as other children whose lives are put in jeopardy by this devastating disease.

This Holiday Season, the Diederichs will surround themselves with family and friends who have helped them through the most trying year of their lives. They know they have the greatest gift of all -- their two wonderful children.

Today, we ask you to share the gift of caring with the 30 million men, women and children who will face the challenges of liver disease in the year ahead. As we all struggle through these days of tightened resources, your continued generosity is appreciated more than ever. Thank you!

Sincerely,

The American Liver Foundation

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