‘I was told there was only a 20% chance that I would survive’: Woman beat the odds to survive a double lung transplant after being diagnosed with emphysema at just 37
Janice Campbell credits her love of Zumba with helping her get healthy again
A WOMAN who needed a double lung transplant after being diagnosed with emphysema at just 37 has spoken out about her harrowing ordeal, which almost saw her body reject the organs.
Janice Campbell, 66, realised there was something wrong when she started getting out of breath when she was walking to work at a bank in the City of London.
Initially she was told she had asthma, but eventually doctors realised it was something much more serious.
"It was very young to get emphysema," Janice explained.
"I didn’t really know what it was and as we didn’t have Google in those days I went to the library and looked it up in the medical dictionary.
"The first thing it said was ‘terminal illness’.
"I thought, ‘What? Oh my God, I’m only 37 and I’ve got a terminal illness.’ I just burst into tears.
"I thought, ‘I’m not going to see my children grown up, what have I done to myself?’ I was blaming myself for doing it."
That was because Janice was a smoker with a 20-a-day habit.
Even when she developed a cough and was told she had asthma she struggled to quit, explaining when she grew up everyone smoked because it was "cool".
Janice tried to kick the habit with hypnotherapy, but it was eventually her dad's offer of £1,000 if she stopped which helped her.
She can vividly remember being told she had chronic lung condition emphysema, which is now known as chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and is a progressive disease that severely limits breathing.
"I was panicking and I went to the doctor and he said I had asthma, without even checking anything, then it got worse and worse and I was referred to hospital," she said.
"They said there was an abnormality in my lungs but they didn’t know what it was.
"I was working for a bank so they sent me privately to a hospital, they said they were going to do a biopsy.
"I thought it would just be a little incision but when I actually woke up they’d done a big slice along my back and I had all tubes and things coming out of me.
"One of the students came in and said, ‘Good grief, one of your lungs is totally squashed at the bottom.’
"That really freaked me out – I don’t think they should have said that to me.
"Anyway, they diagnosed emphysema."
Janice was referred to another hospital where she was told she could be a candidate for a double lung transplant.
It was a very slow process though, as it was hard to find a match for the mum-of-two.
She was called into hospital of four occasions only for the operation to stall on technicalities.
"It’s quite harrowing," she explained.
"When they say it’s no good, it’s sort of a… almost thankful, but not thankful.
"Eventually I was on 24 hour oxygen, I just couldn’t go anywhere without oxygen.
"I had it all around the house.
"I avoided upstairs because I’d have to keep stopping because I’d get out of breath.
"I couldn’t do any housework... I couldn’t do anything without getting out of breath.
"I used to watch people going to the shops, even bent-over, doubled-up old people and I used to feel jealous of them, ‘Why can’t I go?’ It was horrible."
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When she was 59, Janice got the call that would change her life.
She was playing cards with friends when she was told there were organs for her, so she and her husband Andy raced to .
"I was told there was only a 20% chance that I would survive the operation if it goes ahead," she said.
"I had to sign to say I agreed to that – I didn’t have any choice. It was terrifying.
"I said to my husband to get a picture of us together, like a selfie, in case it was our last.
"It was very, very emotional."
Janice doesn't remember much else, apart from a vivid dream she had.
In it she was running along railway tracks while she was being chased by a train, and she woke up to find doctors were about to place a breathing tube into her throat because they hadn't been able to stir her.
She was moved to intensive care and had physiotherapy, but things weren't easy.
At one point her heart had to be shocked into a normal rhythm by a nurse.
After about four weeks Janice was allowed home, but once again things were hard.
She had to take immunosuppressive medication to make sure her body didn't reject her new lungs, but it was a struggle.
"I really was still out of it. I couldn’t remember the tablets," she explained.
"You have to keep a diary of your tablets but my hands were so shaky from all the steroids and things they gave me I couldn’t write in the book and I was just guessing at what the tablets should be, quite honestly.
"I couldn’t eat, everything tasted horrible, I was living on melon.
"I couldn’t drink anything apart from water.
"Eventually I was readmitted to hospital, I was having a rejection.
"They said to me, ‘You haven’t been keeping your diary.’
"They really told me off, ‘You were given this chance and you’ve blown it.’
"I thought, ‘Oh my God, that’s it, I’m gonna die now.’
"I fought back, but I did get very paranoid in there, I thought every tablet they gave me they were trying to kill me. It was just horrible."
Janice overcame her issues and was allowed home, which is when a friend introduced her to Zumba.
Since then she's become a devotee of Beto Perez, who created the dance program, and has even met him.
She does a routine every morning, marking a complete turnaround from her younger years.
"I used to hate gym at school because when I was born I was nearly blind, I had cataracts," she said.
"I spent half my first years of life in a haze because glasses didn’t help cataracts.
"I could see when I was 26 and they operated.
"My ears became very acute so I used to enjoy music, dancing.
"I can remember saying I couldn’t imagine life without dancing."
Now, Janice hopes others will learn from her story.
Her biggest message is about how dangerous smoking is.
"Please do not smoke. It’s just stupid. If I could go back in time and have one wish it would be never to have smoked," she said.
The mum also encourages people to carry donor cards as there is a shortage of organs for people who need them.
"I know they’ve advanced now, they can use lungs that previously they would have thrown out – in fact they’re actually using smokers’ lungs which I don’t think is very good, but they reckon after about five years the lungs will clean themselves through. But it’s not ideal," she said.