MIRAMAR, Fla. – A growing number of Americans are dying from liver disease and liver cancer, and in many cases, it has nothing to do with alcohol consumption.
A rare liver-related disease recently took the life of a young South Florida woman and now her family is honoring her memory and raising awareness.
“Extraordinary, yeah, one in a million, one in a billion.” That’s how those who loved Carolina Gonzalez remember her.
The 33-year old speech therapist with Nicklaus Hospital’s Dan Marino Center died in late August after a long battle with a condition called primary sclerosing cholangitis, or PSC, a disorder affecting the bile ducts of the liver.
“As the disease progresses and damages the bile ducts the cells that make bile are unable to enter the bile ducts and over a period of time it causes an inflammatory cascade that starts to cause fibrosis, scarring and eventually cirrhosis of the liver,” said Dr. Bobby Zervos, a hepatologist with Cleveland Clinic Weston.
Zervos was part of Carolina’s team of specialists who treated Gonzalez.
He said liver transplant is the only known cure for PSC, but the disease may still come back and sadly, it wasn’t an option for Gonzalez.
“There are specific protocols that have been established and unfortunately she fell outside of those protocols and recurrence would be significantly high in her particular case,” Zervos said.
“For us, it was very hard, heartbreaking. But my sister always remained high in faith and she was never fearful of what she had,” said her sister Cristy Fundora.
In her memory, Carolina’s family started a toy drive to benefit pediatric patients throughout the Nicklaus Children’s Hospital System and have been overwhelmed by the response.
“Everybody who knew her, this is the reason they’re giving because even if they didn’t know her personally, they had heard from us how strong she was how kind she was so it kind of gave them more reason to donate,” said her cousin Sandy Munoz.
“The toy drive is very dear to all of us and we’ll support her amazing cause because she was an amazing individual,” Zervos added.
So far the family has collected well over a thousand toys and books, all of which will be delivered to the hospital on Saturday.
Specialists at Cleveland Clinic Weston are currently managing 50 patients with PSC.
A couple of them meet the criteria for a liver transplant and are on the waiting list.