4,400 Reasons – Stephen’s Story
Original article sourced from Diabetes Australia: https://www.diabetesaustralia.com.au/news-resources/news/
In November 2015, Steve, from Rockingham in Western Australia, became one of the 4,400 Australians who underwent a diabetes-related amputation. While that was tough the worst, or so it seemed, was still to come.
Earlier this year escalating problems on his other foot seemed to be leading towards a second below-the-knee amputation, and life in a wheelchair, but thanks to the excellent healthcare provided by Dr Carsten Ritter, Steve is still able to enjoy many of the things he loves including spending time with his two children and getting out and about in his caravan.
Diabetes Australia asked Stephen to talk them through his journey.
“It all started in 1997. I was lying in bed when I heard noise outside,” Stephen said. “I bolted outside, in my underwear, and there were a couple of kids breaking into my car. I managed to scare them off but, in the process, I stepped on some of the glass from my smashed windshield. And that’s where it all started. I thought I’d gotten all of the glass out of my foot but it actually took three years to find it all. When you have type 1 diabetes, something like that can be serious. Eleven operations to remove dead tissue and loss of one-and-a-half toes removed later, I thought that was the end of it. Fast forward eight years and I was helping my boss move this massive desk. Then I did the thing you’re not supposed to do and dropped it on my little toe. There goes another one. But, after that, all things considered, everything going great. I’d even got the hang of my prosthetic right leg.”
“Then this year, as if my feet hadn’t been through enough, some skin split open on my foot around the old scar tissue. It was healing okay until it wasn’t. I got an infection and with the calcified arteries and reduced circulation in the foot it wasn’t looking promising. The doctors started talking about another amputation – not just toes, but the whole foot. But the infection was rampant and the doctors were concerned about how I’d manage an operation and then I was diagnosed with heart failure. It seems like 38 years of living with type 1 diabetes were all adding up.”
But things were about to take a turn for the better thanks to a timely intervention from Dr Carsten Ritter, a specialist vascular surgeon at Western Australia’s Fiona Stanley Hospital.
“The initial plan was to send me home, get rid of the infection and use medication to strengthen my heart. That all changed after talking to Carsten who developed a plan that would see me undergo three procedures. First, he removed all the infected tissue and old scar tissue from the foot including another one-and-a-half toes. All that was left was my big toe. The second part was heart surgery to replace the calcified vessels supplying the heart with veins taken from my right forearm. Finally, I was ready for revascularisation. This involves taking a vein from the leg, turning it upside down and then re-attaching it and connecting it down into the foot to get the blood supply going down to the foot.”
“It’s called a fem-pop bypass. It is not a common option, but the alternative was far worse.” Steve says it is hard to overstate how important the operation has to been to his life.
“Look I’ve lost one leg from below the knee which was bad enough but if I’d have lost the second one the consequences would have been huge. I would have had to give up work and move back to New Zealand. I still like camping and caravanning so all of that would have been off the table. It’s almost too horrible to contemplate. I can’t emphasise enough how important Carsten’s surgery has been to me. It’s given me a shot at a normal future. To continue working, more time with the kids, going to the gym more time doing what I love.”
Steve has a simple message for other people with diabetes. “Get a second opinion. Different health professionals have different skill sets and different ideas on how to manage problems. If you’re not happy with a diagnosis see who else you can talk to. Diabetes research has come so far that there might be something another specialist can do to help you.
“Ringing the team at Fiona Stanley was the best phone call I ever made.”
