Zondra Meaney Creates New GoFundMe Campaign – I Love Limerick’s Richard Lynch pictured with 2016 Carer of the Year Dorothy Meaney and Zondra Meaney. Picture: Dolf Patijn/ilovelimerick
Zondra Meaney Creates New GoFundMe Campaign
By I Love Limerick Correspondent Jordan Mac Cormaic
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Limerick’s Zondra Meaney has recently created a new GoFundMe Campaign to help raise funds towards a potentially life-saving surgery in Spain.
Zondra Meaney is a Limerick lady who has a very rare connective tissue disorder, Ehlers Danlos Syndrome (EDS). She also suffers from a number of secondary disorders, including Chiari Malformation, POTS, autonomic dysfunction and Myasthenia Gravis.
EDS is a rare connective tissue disorder which occurs in approximately 1 in 5,000 people. The condition can affect every system in the body leading to a wide range of apparently unconnected symptoms including joint pain and hypermobility, chronic fatigue, gastrointestinal issues and heart complications. Symptoms can vary from mild to life-threatening.
Unfortunately, the Irish Health System and hospitals are not equipped to deal with the severity of the diagnosis. Most of these conditions could only be diagnosed in the UK by an EDS specialist as diagnostic testing was not available here in Ireland.
Over the past four years, Zondra has travelled to and from London every three months for treatment and consultation as there is no EDS specialist in Ireland.
The Irish Government will not cover anything on the treatment abroad as Zondra’s consultants work privately in hospitals in London. This does not meet the criteria for the treatment abroad scheme.
Zondra’s doctors in Ireland are fantastic and work very hard to help her but she needs the specialist care and would not have come as far as she has now without it.
Zondra tells me, “Unfortunately, due to my Chiari Malformation, I will have to undergo a very tricky brain and neurosurgery that only a handful of neurosurgeons in the world could perform. I am unable to travel long distances so my family and consultants have decided that Spain will be the best option for this vital surgery. I am so grateful to the people of Limerick for all they have done for me and appreciate their ongoing support.”
The prognosis is stroke, paralysis or death and the surgeon has said that Zondra’s case is advanced and has no choice but to operate.
The current goal for Zondra’s GoFundMe is €100,000. If you would like to donate to her GoFundMe campaign click here.
To view the official Facebook page for Zondra’s Treatment Fund click here
To read more Zondra Meaney stories on I Love Limerick click here
