OK Prayer Warriors, A Toyota Brother and His Family Needs Us

Alright, Listen up.

I have a good friend who lives in Nevada and he's a Toyota guy but he is not on TW because he does not own a Tacoma. He (Victor) and his wife (Kristi) have a 20-year old son (Josh) with Duchenne’s Muscular Dystrophy. Now if you know anything about Duchenne’s Muscular Dystrophy you’ll know it is about the worst kind of Muscular Dystrophy there is and people who have it rarely live past the age of 25.

Josh has been in a wheelchair since he was about 12. He has spent the last two weeks in the hospital with congestive heart failure. Their application for a transplant was denied; basically the Muscular Dystrophy was the deciding factor.

Instead Josh and his mom are being flown by helicopter today to the USC Medical Center in Los Angeles and he will be prepped for surgery as soon as they get there. They are going to install something called an LVAD (left ventricular assist device); basically a mechanical pump that takes over the job of the left ventricle. It is not a full artificial heart.

Please round up your prayer circles and get on this. I will be asking this of all my friends who are people of faith.

Thank you, and God bless.

 

Any progress report? Tough time for all involved..God Bless..

 

Looks like the Surgery is happening today (Tuesday). The Helicopter that was booked to fly them to LA had mechanical trouble so they took him on a fixed-wing aircraft instead (designed to transport medical patients) so they had a major delay.

Stay tuned.

 

Another update.

Surgery has been postponed for now. The doctors want to do a battery of tests to evaluate Josh for the best course of action. There may be other options besides going straight to the very invasive LVAD. This all came from the Heart trauma and Thoracic heart surgeon teams.

Stay tuned.

 

for Josh,Kristi,and Victor.

 

Alright, some good news!

The latest from Josh's father:

They have official said no to the LVAD. The risks are to high with the Muscular Dystrophy and possible future complications. We all concur with their decision and thought process. If he was ambulatory it would be a different story. Muscular Dystrophy sucks on so many levels....

They are working on finding the right meds to send him back to Nevada where we will find an adult cardiologist/specialist to continue monitoring and prescribing medicines for him.

Josh is eating great, better each day and all other bodily functions are working as designed.. His lungs are still in great shape.

Hoping to be back to Nevada in a week or so if all goes well. But no official ETA...

 

Update:

The doctors have decided that this LVAD is not the course of action they want to take. Instead they are going try some other things first. This is a good thing because the LVAD was a pretty invasive procedure.

And, Josh got a visit from none other than Jay Leno today!

Whatever we are doing, seems to be working. Keeps those prayers a-coming!

 

Just wanted to bring everyone up to date.

Josh is doing well and is back home in Las Vegas. Things are looking good.

 

Everyone, it is with a heavy heart that I report that our friend Josh passed away back on November 11th. His heart simply gave out.

R.I.P., young man. You were a good kid.

 

I'm sorry to have read this Tim. The loss of an innocent life is always tragic but one so young is devastating. My thoughts and prayers are with his family and all who were touched by his life, like yourself, and have suffered his loss. I learned long ago struggling with my own faith that some things will never make sense. It's human to ask why and humbling to realize you may never know but except it as your faith dictates that it's part of a much greater plan.

 

You got my prayers behind you, brother.

 

The prayers need to go to his Mom and Dad who are having a really hard time.