Chris Kamke, 65, had just beaten breast cancer this summer. Last month she headed to Utah's national parks with her husband, Kendall, and son Kyle to celebrate her recovery on a family hiking trip — and came home in a coma, paralyzed and dependent on a ventilator.
The family is from Oshkosh, Wisconsin, WBAY reported. On September 19 they hiked the Narrows at Zion National Park, and Chris felt good. She was the picture of an active retiree: walking, kayaking, biking, golfing — still playing softball at 65. Nobody expected what came the next day.
At Emerald Pools the next day, Kamke developed severe pain in her hips and legs. It kept worsening; by the time the family reached Bryce Canyon, she could not sit, stand or lie down. Her husband and son drove her about 30 minutes to a hospital in Panguitch, Utah. Doctors first thought it was the heat. Then she struggled to breathe, a CT scan revealed fluid in her lungs, and she was diagnosed with bacterial pneumonia. On September 20 she was airlifted to the intensive care unit at Intermountain Health St. George Regional Hospital.
Doctors believe that while her body was fighting the infection, her immune system began attacking her spinal cord, with inflammation spreading to her brainstem. The final diagnosis: neuromyelitis optica spectrum disorder (NMOSD), a rare autoimmune disease affecting roughly one in 250,000 people that causes inflammation of the nerves in the eye and spinal cord. Her sister Tammy Thomas said Chris had been extremely active — "nobody could have seen something like this coming."
Since September 25, Kamke has been comatose, paralyzed and on a ventilator. According to the family's GoFundMe, she has undergone five days of high-dose steroid treatments and three plasmapheresis sessions so far, with no signs of improvement. Her husband, son and sister have been holding vigil nearly 1,700 miles from home.
The family's dearest wish is to bring her back to Wisconsin to be surrounded by loved ones. But a medical transport flight could exceed $50,000, and her insurer declined to cover it. A nonprofit, Grace on Wings, can provide medical air transport for an estimated $27,000 to $28,000, and the GoFundMe has already raised more than $25,000. The family hopes to have her home within a week.