NN&I - April 2010
44 Nephrology News & Issues April 2010www.nephronline.comPatient Travel Up, up, and away: Make travel part of your lifeBy James Smith Mr. Smith does extensive travelingand dialyzingwith a NxStage System One dialysis machine. He can be reached at heartweave@gmail.com.Until 2007, my life was spent about 50% of the time on air -planes for business and pleasure travel. Flying up to 100,000 miles a year had become my lifestyle. Then came the Big Dno, not Dallas, but rather something that sounds almost the same: dialysis. After years of over-eating and hypertensive, diabetic liv-ing, my kidneys gave out and I was relegated to thrice-week -ly dialysis. That began April 4, 2007, and The Northwest Kidney Center (NKC) became my lifeline. I realized early on that my travel itch would be severely limited, having to visit the same center, the same three days a week, for the rest of my lifeor at least until I could get a transplant. So like a prisoner plotting his escape, I started looking at all the avenues available to flee my rigid lifestyle. My second week of treatment, I discovered a wonderful person: the travel coordinator for NKC. Her sole job was to help in-center patients to travel almost anywhere by mak -ing the necessary contacts, gathering the necessary paper -work, and helping prepare the patients for transient dialy -sis. Cheryl became my most important contact at NKC and as such provided me with access to the one thing I enjoyed the most: travel. Having met my wife, a Georgia native, in early 2007, the pressure was on to travel there to meet my future in-laws. The joy was the discovery of a small dialysis clinic less than one mile from their home in Georgia. The lights flashed and horns sounded. It was possible to dialyze and travel, at least to one small stop in northern Georgia. But again it was dialysis on their schedule and their days. But it did allow me to take step one in returning to travel on my sched-ule. Since that time I have taken many steps and continue learning everyday.Self-advocacy is important for every patient; do not accept someone in your dialysis center telling you that you can't travel. There are very few medium-sized cities in the United States and Canada that do not have at least one dialysis center. With a little planning, you can go almost anywhere you want, visit friends and relatives, see the sights, attend a Broadway play, and dip you toes in the warm sands of Hawaii. Keeping dreams alive while on dialysis is a critical fac-tor for good health. Whether it is a sightseeing trip or some time with your friends, having that carrot out there gives you purpose, day to day, to keep on keeping on.Most centers have a transient dialysis coordinator whose job is to facilitate visiting patients. Once you decide where you want to go, do a search on the Internet for dialysis cen-ters in the city you want. One source is www.dialysisfinder. com. It is just one of many websites you can look at to get information. Once you have the contact information, pick up the telephone and call the center you wish to visit and ask for the transient dialysis coordinator. Tell him or her the dates you would like to visit their center (start plan-ning two-to-four weeks ahead). Once they accept you, they will have a number of forms to fax to you that you will take to your home center. They can complete these for you and forward them to the center you are visiting. Most centers want to know that your immunization records are up to date (Hepatitis A, B, and C, tetanus, etc.) Also many clinics require that you get a MRSA test one week or sooner before arriving at their center.Going abroadSo what about traveling internationally? I have been in 11 countries, and12 U.S. states and Canadian provinces. In 2010, I will be adding two new countries (Australia and New Zealand) and five new states to my travel log. In 2011, I hope to add four new countries and a few more states. The foreign dialysis centers are usually outstanding and offer excellent care. In most cases, your insurance will not pick up the costs at the time of your treatment. You will most likely need to pay for the treatments and then file a reimbursement claim once you return to the United States. As long as you have your receipts from your foreign treat -ment runs, your insurance company will usually cover your expense, less your deductible. Of interest is that I have found most foreign centers charge less than U.S. centers for a treatment. The foreign centers are often very curious about your treatments and about dialysis center at home. Take some photos and be ready to tell your story. Often the visitor centers will show you some new ideas and tricks to make your dialysis better. Be open to learn, as every run is a new experience. Patient Travel_NNI0410_5.indd 44 3/18/10 4:49:18 PM
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