StemCell Therapy

LEXINGTON, Ky. (WKYT/WYMT) As the COVID-19 pandemic continues to sweep the globe and death tolls keeps increasing, miraculous stories of survival are coming to light as well.

A Berea native who currently lives in Florida is currently fighting the disease and spoke to sister-station WKYT about her experience and how it changed her life.

"I feel like I am a walking miracle," says Kendra Wiggins.

Weeks following her diagnosis, she is now on the road to recovery.

As part of her effort, she signed up for an experimental double-blind drug trial after her diagnosis.

"It was just like breath in, cough, breath in, cough, that I couldn't get enough oxygen out," she says. "I took the 80 percent chance that I would get medication over the 20 percent chance that I wouldn't because with that 20 percent chance I still had what I thought was 50-50 with a ventilator."

The trial was for a drug known as Kevzara- typically used as a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis and consisted of three groups; some received a full dose, others received a half dosage, and the third group was given a placebo instead of the actual drug.

"I woke up about a half an hour into the medication with the worst heartburn ever. It was terrible. And all I could do was say 'Praise the Lord I got the real medication! If this had been saline, I wouldn't have felt anything, so I was so excited that I had heartburn. Never been excited for heartburn in my life," says Wiggins.

Wiggins says the treatment saved her life, and she hopes her experience will give hope to future COVID patients.

"Flattening the curve gave the medical community a chance to have guinea pigs, she says. I signed up willingly to be a human guinea pig and the information that they got from me is going to benefit you or someone you know."

Read more here:
Rheumatoid arthritis drug may have helped Kentucky native recover from COVID-19 - WYMT News

This entry was posted on May 7, 2020 at 7:47 am and is filed under Arthritis. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed. |