Edmonton doctor recalls day he saved patient 50 years ago with hemodialysis
BY BRENT WITTMEIER, EDMONTON JOURNAL DECEMBER 19, 2012 9:43 PM
Retired Dr. Ray Ulan speaks about kidney dialysis at the UofA Hospital in Edmonton on Wednesday Dec 19, 2012.
Photograph by: John Lucas , Edmonton Journal
EDMONTON - On a cold December day 50 years ago, Calgary paramedics loaded Diane Sutton into an ambulance, where a Catholic priest quickly administered last rites in case the 17-year-old didn’t make it.
The teen’s kidneys were failing, and that Dec. 20, 1962, Sutton was rushed to the University of Alberta Hospital in Edmonton for an innovative, potentially life-saving new treatment.
The next day, Edmonton became the first Canadian city — after Seattle, the second worldwide — to use hemodialysis to treat chronic kidney failure.
There were technical hiccups. Doctors discovered a critical piece of tubing was missing. The next hours were hard for Sutton’s parents and six younger siblings, who waited and wondered if Diane could pull through.
“My mother came into our rooms, I remember it like it was yesterday,” said younger brother Darrel Sutton, now 65. “She said, ‘kids, you need to get on your knees, and you need to pray, because your sister really needs some help.’”
The missing piece arrived from Seattle early Friday afternoon, and the next day, Diane was sitting up, smiling and talking.
Fifty years later, Dr. Ray Ulan stands in the U of A hospital’s dialysis centre which bears his name, celebrating the anniversary of a hectic and exciting day when doctors were able to save a life. Ulan was just a “kid” in 1962, a 26-year-old resident working with renowned kidney specialist Dr. Lionel McLeod. It was life-changing for him too.
“That’s what caused me to continue in nephrology. That made up my mind,” Ulan said Wednesday. “It was cool. We didn’t say cool at that time, but it was.”
Until 1960, kidney failure led to death; dialysis was for short-term problems, its effects lasting just a few weeks.
But McLeod had been watching Dr. Belding Scribner, a Seattle colleague whose team created a Teflon shunt to allow repeated access to blood vessels, making dialysis accessible for serious patients. Less than two years after the first success, McLeod’s team flew in to train.
Robert and Beatrice Sutton had been living in Irricana, deciding to move to Edmonton that fall. Two of their children were deaf, and Edmonton had an innovative school. Robert was able to transfer to Edmonton, and while looking for a house, spotted a Journal story about an engineer who flew to Seattle for dialysis. The article also mentioned McLeod’s plans to bring the technology north.
A popular brunette who loved to sing country songs, Diane was in and out of the General Hospital in Calgary. Her father pestered doctors to see if the new technology could save her. Inquiries were made. Then one night, the phone rang: Diane was a candidate.
Years later, Ulan would eventually lead Edmonton’s burgeoning nephrology specialty, watching dialysis improve and more patients receive successful transplants until his retirement a few years ago. Dialysis currently helps over 1,100 patients at 22 sites in northern Alberta.
Dr. Kailash Jindal, head of the northern Alberta Renal Program, said many patients undergo treatment in their homes, 60 on dialysis machines and another 180 with a form of dialysis involving bags of fluids changed every few hours.
Jindal preaches prevention of diabetes and blood pressure, the leading causes of kidney failure. Nearly 38,000 Canadians had kidney failure in 2009, more than triple the number from 20 years earlier, a sign of an aging population.
“When we started, we were very selective who we treated, mostly young people who didn’t have a lot of complications,” Jindal said. “Now our average age is 66 or 68-years-old, lots of diabetes, a lot of heart disease, people are much sicker.”
Diane continued 12-hour sessions twice a week, when she wasn’t making up for her many high school absences. She would never became a singer, but her brothers are glad she had a stint as a second mom to a new baby brother, also deaf, born in 1963.
Blood donations — administered occasionally to boost low energy levels — weren’t as carefully screened back then, and Diane contracted hepatitis B. On May 15, 1967, her mother discovered her feet were cold. She died soon after while her mother held her hand.
“We should be proud of how strong she was and how brave she was,” said Darrel. “I still think Jesus had a lot to do with it. He had other plans for her, he had more things that she needed to look after.”
bwittmeier@edmontonjournal.com
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