Wednesday, December 26, 2007
Private ills, public serviceMANY, perhaps most, of the thousands of people who need kidney dialysis are reluctant to talk about it. That's not the case with former mayor Jack Ford, who is open about the fact that he is undergoing dialysis at home while maintaining several public positions.
Now a member of the Toledo Board of Education and a full-time professor at Bowling Green State University, Mr. Ford deserves enormous credit for talking publicly about his health problems in an effort to raise awareness and remind people to take care of themselves - and take their medication.
People listen when Mr. Ford talks about high blood pressure, diabetes, and kidney disease because he has the credibility that comes from having all those ailments himself.
At 60, he is a Type 2 diabetic with high blood pressure. At the same time, he is serving, in a volunteer capacity, as development director of the Kidney Foundation of Northwest Ohio. In the last several weeks, he's raised $35,000.
The money is badly needed because the rise of kidney disease is truly staggering. The number of people the foundation treats is expected to double to 7,000 in the next five years. Thirty years ago, about 30,000 Americans suffered from kidney failure. Now, 10 times that many do.
Few have handled the constant adversity as well as Mr. Ford. He's been on dialysis for seven months, and during that time he's managed to keep up with his duties at BGSU, accept appointment to the TPS board, and run a successful campaign to be elected in his own right. He's proof that dialysis patients can live full, vigorous lives.
Undergoing dialysis at home, a procedure that takes 20-25 minutes, four times a day, gives him the flexibility to meet this busy schedule. The alternative - treatment at a dialysis center - took four hours, three days a week.
Mr. Ford knows he'll need a kidney transplant eventually. In the meantime, the candid acknowledgment of his private health problems is just one more selfless gesture by one of Toledo's most public-spirited citizens.
http://toledoblade.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20071226/OPINION02/712260305
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