Dialysis bag donors needed for ailing dad of 4

Sunday, July 08, 2007
SUN STAR - PHILLIPINES

Dialysis bag donors needed for ailing dad of 4

FRANCIS Alvez and Jo Ann Brillantes finished high school on the same year in adjoining campuses but never met until they were classmates in the College of Engineering of St. Louis University.

Their alma maters - the SLU boy and girls laboratory high schools - have since turned co-educational and transferred to the former all-girl St. Theresa's High along Navy Rd.

Francis and Jo Ann eventually got married and are now trying to raise and provide education to their four kids.

Last year, members of Francis' Boys' high school class began getting introduced to Jo Ann's distaff batch, mainly through the boys' slulbhsbatch81.org website which they opened up to their alumnae counterparts.

After all, they all belong to Batch '81. After all, many of them are now also fathers and mothers.

The reunion of sorts began when one of the boys posted on the web a news item on Francis' medical affliction.

The illness was diagnosed on Nov. 26, 2005, after Francis, then with Holcim, almost collapsed at the opening of a new office of the cement firm in Bulacan.

Jo Ann remembers that date, when doctors confirmed her husband was suffering from kidney failure. She remembers Holcim's generosity that, for months, bankrolled Francis' costly twice-a-week dialysis and other medical needs.

Those regular blood-cleansing sessions, however, must have to be for life. Just when the couple was drained of resources, Francis’ condition triggered a reconnection among members of Batch '81, some of whom are now settled abroad.

They raised between P70 to P80 thousand that sustained Francis' dialysis. Jo Ann remembers some of the movers among them.

There's Marcia Aym Floresca-Weaver in the United States, Melson Pabustan in Australia, Alex Monis, Martin Valeriano and Richard Sajonas.

“One of them, a medical doctor now living in Canada, was due for a heart by-pass last February but reset it to be of help to Francis,” Jo Ann noted. “We want to recognize him but I’m not sure if he wants his name to be mentioned in the papers.”

Jo Ann, who turned 42 last Thursday, will receive her five-year service award as barangay nutrition action officer (BNAO) on Aug 3, during the closing program of the city's observance of National Nutrition Month.

She doesn't remember when the country honored her as its most outstanding barangay nutrition worker or "scholar" (BNS), as volunteers like her are euphemistically and officially addressed. (She received the national award in 2005, a signal honor for the city and its nutrition council.)

Although an industrial engineering graduate, Jo Ann opted to serve young mothers and their babies and pre-schoolers at Salud Mitra Barangay where her family resides. Until Francis was stricken with the disease, his salary was just enough. Now, the family of six has to depend on Jo Ann's monthly honorarium of P2,300 - P1,300 as BNS and P1,000 as BNAO.

Erick Cyngyn, the couple's eldest at 18, is in third year college. Sixteen-year old Nikko Cyryll is in fourth year high, Merlin, 11, is in the sixth grade, and Eryn Kae, 7, is in the second grade.

In last Monday's flag ceremony that launched Nutrition Month at the City Hall grounds, Jo Ann and fellow nutrition worker Remedios Martinez led the incoming city officials to a "hataw" exercise. It's part of her job to lead, as president of the city's barangay nutrition action officers and vice president of the city’s 128 nutrition scholars.

Except for her fellow health workers, perhaps none in the crowd watching the city officials doing aerobics knew what her family is going through, or that working well is part of her coping.

Francis, who turned 43 last May 24, was shifted to daily peritoneal dialysis last September, with a connecting tube attached to the side of his abdomen. His veins were collapsing, making it difficult for him to be attached to the hospital blood cleansing machine. The shift requires a change of dialysis bags three times per day. Each bag costs P270.

"Given the costs, Francis told the doctors he'll have one bag per day but they told him it can't be," Jo Ann said. "His fighting spirit hasn't waned even while he's losing weight as it's difficult for him to take in food."

After Monday's launching of Nutrition Month, a Baguio expatriate raising her daughter in Kentucky joined the efforts of Holcim and Batch ‘81. She contributed P2,000 for the next set of dialysis bags. She never knew Francis or Jo Ann, having graduated from the University of Baguio Science High.

The amount was part of a $200 fund she sent for seriously ill patients in her native city and province of Benguet. It was her latest in a series of humanitarian remittances that began last year, when she was fighting cancer. She said it was her way of remembering her eldest sister who succumbed to the disease on June 28 last year.

Like her, Baguio boy Freddie de Guzman, an SLU architecture graduate now living in Canada, has been sending fund support to patients here since April last year.

He recently transmitted P17,000, of which P7,000 was for Filbert Almoza, a 24-year old father also undergoing dialysis, and the remaining P10,000 for Grace Biogan, a mother of three whose husband Elmer recently succumbed to cancer.

Those who would like to follow suit may ring Jo Ann's cellphone number: 09195294047. (Ramon Dacawi)

(July 8, 2007 issue)