Thinus and Marinda van Jaarsveld are a loving couple who have their backs to the wall. Marinda suffers from chronic kidney failure, which slowly reared its ugly head after the couple undertook a trip to Oudtshoorn to attend the Klein Karoo Arts Festival in 2007.
Thinus and Marinda van Jaarsveld are a loving couple who have their backs to the wall. Marinda suffers from chronic kidney failure, which slowly reared its ugly head after the couple undertook a trip to Oudtshoorn to attend the Klein Karoo Arts Festival in 2007.
According to Thinus, Marinda became sick on the way, "We had to head back to Grahamstown and then her left leg swelled up". There where regular visits to the doctor, lasting seven months, and the disease was diagnosed. The failure required the family to travel to Port Elizabeth three times a week for dialysis, each session lasting four hours.
Such constraints have required Thinus to leave his full time job and take care of his wife, which he says is a full-time process as he has to be at her side at all times. After the diagnosis, Thinus offered to donate a kidney, where after two years of paperwork and blood test to check for a match.
“We first had to get permission from the Minister of Health to proceed with the transplant,” said Thinus. The transplant was done on 12 May 2009, but it was found that Marinda had a hole in her colon, the material from the colon was pressing against the kidney.
Two weeks after the transplant, a blood clot got stuck in the kidney and killed it; her condition slowly deteriorated to such an extent that she had to spend a further four months in hospital slipping in and out of comas, with low blood pressure and respiratory problems. However, she recovered and the colostomy bag she was using for her colon problems was removed.
Marinda is now waiting for another transplant to be approved by her medical aid, but she is on the transplant list with thousands of other people. Thinus says that the medical bills are very high for the transplant, but hopes this year it could be less. “Last time it was R380 000 and the bill for the four month stay in Cape Town was R1.1 million,” he added.
They also say that there is a need for a renal unit in Grahamstown, the cost of travelling to Port Elizabeth is high and there are others who also have the same problem. “There was a renal unit in Grahamstown but it closed down in 2008,” said Thinus.
Financially, they are struggling as Marinda, who worked for the SAPS, has been medically boarded. They bake cakes for home industries when they are not travelling to Port Elizabeth, something they will continue to do until Marinda gets a suitable donor.
