E-MAIL RECEIVED 1/28/2023 FROM A GRATEFUL MOTHER

First, I would like to thank everyone at the Free Clinic for, first of all, contributing their time and knowledge and mostly for being such caring, and kind people. You are such a blessing to Chris. We just can't thank you enough.
Chris was always a hard worker and had a full-time job, with insurance till he was diagnosed in 2019-2020 with Myotonic Dystrophy. The neurologist he was seeing advised him to get on disability as soon as possible and to stop working as his symptoms were advanced enough to be a risk of falling and injuring himself. His symptoms were there years before, but he thought it was from his stressful job, long hours, etc. Once he stopped working and had no insurance he continued to see the specialists neurologist and endocrinologist for Thyroid, which decreased his savings. It took almost two years for him to get on disability.  No income and still seeing two specialists, he still had no insurance.  We heard about the Free Clinic here in Citrus Co. and started seeing Dr. McNeel.  We needed him for a primary care doctor since Chris had none. Dr. McNeel advised that he should continue with his specialist doctors, but he could help him with other needs. Chris had been having a lot of lower abdominal pain after every meal for the last 6 months.  Got to the point where he didn't want to eat, cause it would cause him so much pain. Dr. McNeel referred him to Dr. Wallis through the We Care program.  Another wonderful program.  Went to see him and he recommended to do an Endoscopy to start to figure out what the problem was. We needed to delay getting it done since we had a vacation coming up. We were set to have it done, and in the meantime Chris got sick, not sure with what at the time, but he was running a fever on and off for days and coughing. He kept putting off being seen as he was getting worse, I insisted he go to a walk-in clinic (one of my other sons has CHF and was scheduled to have a heart cath at Shands the next day). Chris decided he would go with us and if he got worse he would go to the emergency room there. He did end up in the emergency room at Shands and was admitted for Acute Hypoxemia Respiratory Failure. Multifocal pneumonia, Myotonic Dystrophy. He was tested for Covid, which was negative. He was up in Shands 11/18/2022 to 11/23/2022. They never addressed his lower abdominal pain.  We're back in Inverness and we see Dr. McNeel and he ordered blood work and we were set to see Dr. Wallis for the endoscopy.
A couple of days later I am out shopping, and I received a call from Karla at the Free Clinic that Dr. McNeel had received the blood test results and his Hgb  was low and he needed to go to the hospital. Which we did and he was admitted for low Hgb and pneumonia, myotonic dystrophy. Dr. Wallis was at the hospital while Chris was there and we spoke and he suggested to get his Endoscopy while in the hospital, since anesthesia was a concern with his Myotonic dystrophy. Chris had it done and the results showed some inflammation and irritation and biopsies were done.  Chris wasn't responding to the IV antibiotics he was given for the pneumonia and a surgeon was called in, Dr. Kim. He recommended surgery since the fluid in his lung became very thick and also encapsulated in small sections. They had put in chest tubes which were not pulling out a lot of fluid. Dr. Kim ended up doing a thoracentesis and a decortication. Chris was in the hospital from 12/08/2022 to 12/26/2022. He has been recovering at home and is doing very well. I believe that the caring and efficient staff at the Free Clinic helped to save my son's life. I am so grateful to all the people at the Free Clinic. It is a wonderful asset to our community. With so many doctors and nurses contributing their time. Never can say "Thank you so much" enough. 

Sincerely,

Susan Treacy