Robbed of nourishment after shower mishap
Young Nelson woman Georgie Ferris has spent the past four years battling intestinal failure.
The 21-year-old is desperate to live a ‘‘normal’’ life. She wants to study at university, go flatting with friends and travel overseas.
But she has been unable maintain a healthy weight as she struggles to keep food down. At her lowest, she weighed 38kg.
Earlier in the year, the community helped to raise more than $25,000 for Georgie to travel to Melbourne to see a gastroenterologist who specialised in intestinal tract disorders.
The trip was a success. Georgie returned to New Zealand with a plan to help keep her weight up and get her health back.
She was seen by the New Zealand National Intestinal Failure Service through the Auckland District Health Board on behalf of the Ministry of Health.
The Melbourne specialist used a scope to look inside her oesophagus and stomach and trialled a feeding tube inserted into her bowel but Georgie was still vomiting, which showed her bowel was refluxing the feeds into her stomach.
The other option was to intravenous nutrition, a method of feeding that bypassed the gastrointestinal tract using a Hickman line, a catheter inserted into the chest.
Georgie had trialled IV nutrition in 2015, but was reluctant to do so again as she developed a serious blood infection in her Hickman line which saw her rushed to Auckland Hospital by air ambulance.
But she understood it was her best shot at maintaining a healthy weight. Upon returning from Melbourne, she spent more than a month in Auckland Hospital where she received IV nutrition and gained 15kg.
Administered through a catheter for between 12 to 16 hours a day, IV nutrition is fluid added to the bloodstream that bypasses the digestive system.
Her weight rose to 53kg, but more importantly she had energy and felt human.
But after returning to Nelson, Georgie said things reached breaking point, it was the lowest she had ever been.
Her Hickman line was dislodged from her chest during a shower at Nelson Hospital and her team at Auckland Hospital said they would not be inserting another, as it was the second catheter she had lost under ‘‘concerning circumstances’’.
‘‘It was soul destroying, there were no words to explain it.
‘‘That was keeping me alive, why would I pull it out?’’
She was given a feeding tube through her nasal cavity but they would often dislodge from her stomach when she vomited so she was told that was no longer an option either.
For want of a better term, she said the situation was ‘‘gut wrenching’’.
She was initially diagnosed with gastroparesis but it seemed there was disagreement between specialists over what sort of intestinal failure she was suffering from.
‘‘I think it’s hard when you have a rare illness and they don’t know what to do.’’
‘‘It’s like they don’t want to feed me.’’
She is now back down to 43kg, struggles to digest food, vomits after eating and often ends up with bowel blockages which require hospital admission.
‘‘I can’t get enough calories in to sustain a normal life.’’
Not only is her weight falling again, she has no options for intravenous nutrition and has been told she needs to try eating as much as she can in the hope it will retrain her stomach.
An NG tube inserted through her nasal cavity helps to drain her stomach contents as she cannot digest her own stomach bile.
She knows the reality of her condition is that she could starve to death.
It is not uncommon for her to wake up in a pool of vomit, and she sometimes sleeps on the floor of her bathroom because it is easier than getting in and out of bed all night.
Georgie’s twin sister Livvie has also put her life on hold to care for her sister and support her during countless hospital admissions.
‘‘It takes a massive toll on us as a family.’’
The pair spent their 21st birthday together in Auckland Hospital which Georgie described as ‘‘horrendous’’ when all she wanted to do was sit on the beach.
Georgie’s mum, Robyn Maxwell-Ferris, said it felt like the family were in limbo again and struggling to see Georgie nourished. But the illness had strengthened the family and she said her daughter was a fighter. ‘‘When the going gets tough, Georgie gets going.’’