CATEGORY:SPECIAL REPORT ---------------------------- Inside Grenada Thursday January 18,2007 PLEASE HELP THIS LITTLE GIRL GRENADA, you may recall that --- a couple years ago --- while working with another radio station, I came to you asking for help! Help for a young woman from Carriacou who had been torched --- set ablaze. Grenada, you responded beyond my wildest expectations, and we were able to send the young lady to Boston and New York for treatment. Grenada felt good --- because Grenada showed her love and caring!!! Today, I come to you again --- at a very difficult time in our history, and under very difficult circumstances --- asking you to help someone in desperate need. This time, a 7 year old girl from Hope, in St. Andrew. Her name is Zedina, and for several months she had been receiving dialysis in Barbados --- thanks to the Government of Grenada which was responsible for all major expenses, and also assistance in kind from friends and the Rotary Club of Barbados. However, at the end of this month, she will be denied ongoing access to treatment because of financial constraints. In early December, Eugene Pulido (the Director of Clinical Operations at Island Health Services) received a frantic call from Zedina's mother regarding her daughter's plight. The folks at Island Health Services promptly advised her to gather her daughter's medical records and come back to Grenada and they would seek to raise the necessary funding to treat her daughter. Zedina’s best chance of survival is a transplant. Trevor Forrestor --- one of the key persons behind the setting up of I.H.S recently informed me that they are utilizing every contact and resource to get her on the transplant/donation network, but as you can imagine this takes some time. In the meantime, Zedina will require dialysis three time week until the transplant. Coverage for the year will cost Zedina EC$ 95,760.00 (US$ 35,250.00), of which, the family has no chance of achieving on their own and the Government of Grenada exhausted their per patient funding on Zedina. Grenadian patients receive dialysis services at cost, because of an agreement between Island Health Services and the Government of Grenada. Government has provided them with concessions as part of that agreement. Grenada, Zedina is beautiful young girl with her whole life ahead of her. The folks at the dialysys clinic here will begin dialysis on her --- even though the clinic is just getting started --- because Trevor, Eugene, Sue and the rest of the team there feel that it would be a shame to loose such a young life to a condition that is manageable and curable, just because of cost. That being said, they still have a responsibility to their other patients. And, as a start-up company, they too, are under financial constraints, so funding for Zedina is critical to their survival and that of their patients. Hence the reason, Grenada, that I humbly come to you again --- pleading for your help. We need to find about EC$96,000 --- that's about US$36,000. We don't have to have it all by tomorrow morning, but we do need to have it. I am also not asking you as an individual to find $96,000. But, instead, I am asking you in some way or another to chip in with whatever you can afford. Be it the cost of a packet of cigarettes, part of your cell phone budget, the cost of some of the beer you planned on drinking this weekend --- whatever, Grenada. Some of you may be able organize fundraisers --- a tea party, a barbeque, a dance, a bake sale --- whatever, Grenada. Please help!!!! Not just to save a life, but to show that we --- as Grenadians, still have a heart. And, those of you across the pond, just know that your help would be greatly appreciated!!! The Kidney Foundation of Grenada has an account at RBTT Bank to accept charitable donations: Account Name: Grenada Kidney Dialysis Association Account Number: 5536099 SWIFT CODE: RBTTGDGD Bank Name: RBTT Bank Bank Address: RBTT Bank, P.O Box 4, St. George s, Grenada Contact Info: Trevor Forrester at 473-407-6544 or email at tforrester@islandhealthservices.com Eugene Pulido at 473-457-7914 or email at epulido@islandhealthservices.com Sue Kirk Clinic Manager at 473-435-3234 or email skirk@islandhealthservices.com Article reprinted from grenadaexplorer.com