Transcription
Hi guys. As many of you probably already know, my fiance Bella has been on life support for the past 5 days at this point.
First of all, thank you to everybody who sent love and prayers and support to the both of us. I, we really really really appreciate it, and you helped all of you more than you than you know. And an even bigger thank you to all the people who actively helped save Bella's life. Um, too many to list. You guys know who you are, from here to Miami to New York to Philadelphia. So many people stepped up and and did everything that they could to help her survive.
I'm making this video not just to tell all of you guys what's happening, but even more important than that, to tell the world that in US medical insurance companies are killing people for money. Bella had a rough childhood. She was born with a congenital heart condition, and we never made this public. Um, and so she's been on insurance and in in hospitals for forever. Uh, but the past 2 years, 3 years, her heart was doing better. She was happy. We were eating healthy, training, and and she was doing much, much better. Her heart was under control, and everything was fine. And we never had any issues before. Even before I came in the picture, you know, or in her life with her insurance, everything was smooth. But in the past maybe 3, 4 years or so, something changed. I don't know what, um, at what level, but every single thing that she needed was a problem, whether it was an exam, a bloods, or an MRI, or even just simply refilling her meds. But she was doing fine. She was happy. Her heart was okay.
Until a few days ago when, out of the blue, without notice, she had a seizure. Full body, horrible seizure. Terrifying. It lasted about maybe 40 seconds. I was very worried. Needless to say, I told her like, "Hey, you know," when she recovered, I said like, "Hey, I know it's going to be a pain. You don't want to be in the hospitals, but we need to check this out cuz this is not normal." I barely made it to finish my sentence. And she had another one. This time it lasted 8 minutes. Those were the longest 8 minutes of my life. The only reason I know it was 8 minutes is because I was on the phone with the 911, telling them what was happening, receiving instruction on what to do. That's the time they took to arrive, and the seizure was not stopping. It only stopped when they injected her with whatever drugs they gave her. She was then rushed to the closest hospital and she was rushed to the ICU. She kept seizing, and she had these horrible seizures every 20 minutes for two days straight. Whatever meds they were giving her, however they were trying to stop the seizures, nothing worked. They had no idea what was causing it. They still have no idea what's causing it. Um, all the exams they could do at this hospital showed nothing. They have no idea. And they told us, "We don't have the equipment. We don't have the staff to even monitor her her brain and to know what's going on. She needs to be transferred to a higher facility."
Because they were not able to stop the seizures, they had to put her on life support, to avoid damages on brain or heart. And they did that waiting for a transfer, which is not an easy thing to begin with. And that's the first problem. Through some amazing friend of mine, we were able to get a doctor to accept her and see her right away. This doctor called me personally on my phone the next day and after explaining him briefly what was going on, he said like, "Yep, let's let's move her, let's transfer right away this afternoon," and so we started the process, which is incredibly difficult and complicated to begin with, which again it shouldn't be. Her insurance, Regal medical group, calls me and they say the transfer is approved; we were happy, let's go. And they said whatever she needs is everything is approved. And so we prep the papers and the hospital prep the papers. The doctors start communicating with each other. And of course there's now a room to find and other things going into a transfer like this. Especially if a patient is intubated and on life support. But despite everybody rushing that first day, the transfer didn't happen. So the shift changed for the night. Nobody knew anything. We had to wait for the morning. Next morning, she's still on life support. We were all right, you know, the trans is going to happen today, and nothing is moving. Um, I go and ask information to the case manager at the hospital she's in, and she said she's not going to [hospital name]. She's going to this little hospital which still don't have the equipment nor the staff to cure her or to even know what she has. And I'm like, "This doesn't make sense. Why would you guys send her there? Like, who decided this? We have a doctor waiting for her, a senior doc, and is one of the best in the world. Like, what what what's going on?" And she told me that Regal decided this. Apparently, a supervisor came in and reviewed the case and they backed off. They revoked the authorization for the transfer to the hospital that she needs to be where a doctor is waiting for her and she instead wanted to transfer her to this non-well-equip hospital to save money, to save money to the company. So when the quarter balance comes out and you know she can show that she saved a buck and maybe get a few hundred as a bonus. This is what they do. They kill people for money. Just like contract killers, I guess, but this is legal for some reason. So, Supervisor Chan um decided to play with my fiance's life to try to save some money. Everybody is absolutely infuriated. This hospital, the other hospital, all the doctors, all the nurses, they say this is ridiculous. I contact the department of managed health care and I open a case, urgent case, because of course this this is not okay. They start working on the case right away, but they say it's going to take 7 days. She she doesn't have 7 days. She can only be on life support for 14 days, and 2 days already passed and we still don't know what she has. Everybody involved, and I will always be grateful for all the people that helped more than I can express. All the doctors started to team up with each other and I guess and I'm just guessing cuz I'm not in the room at this point. I'm with her cuz I think these are these might be the last moments that I have with her. And I think they start pushing against the insurance company against Regal for this transfer to happen. And finally they seem to get it done. Mind you, at this point another day passed, another day with her being on life support. So at this point everything is ready to go. They reapproved the transfer and so the entire process has to start again: new papers, a new finding a new room, finding an internal medicine doctor that can communicate with this internal medicine doctor because we already have the main doctor, a cedar accepting her and find transportation and all that. And in all this, in the midst at some point during this process, I offered to pay out of pocket everything. I said I don't care. I don't care how much it cost. I'll pay for transport, hospital, everything. Screw the insurance.
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And they said no. They said I I couldn't. They said that the payment had to come from an insurance. They couldn't take it from a private, which it's mind-blowing. And and whether or not that was a legit thing, I didn't have the time. I don't have the time to get a lawyer involved in and start something because she doesn't have time. She needs to be transferred right now. Five days passed and while pushing and pushing and pushing with all the connection that I could have and all the connections my close friends could have, still we had so such a hard time playing with somebody's life like this for money. It's it's unbelievable.
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Today she was supposed to be transferred finally. It was 6:00 p.m., and then they moved it to 7:00 p.m., and then they moved it to 8:00 p.m. And at the time I'm making this video, they let you leave ICU unfortunately at 8:00 p.m. So I couldn't be there anymore. It's past 9, and she's still there. I hope that they will transfer her tonight. But I love this country. I came here for a reason and and I wouldn't change it. But the health care system is criminal here. It's absolutely criminal. They let people die for money. For them, dollars are more important than than human life. And this should not be the case. They should be in the business of saving lives. Instead, they are just in business. And what happened to Bella could happen to anybody.
So, a lot of people ask me how they can help. There's no GoFundMe. This is not about money. I thank you all from the bottom of my heart. But if you want to help, I guess we need to shame insurance, health insurance companies. We see these stories on the news and and we think maybe it's one in a million, but there's no going through this. I found out that I have four close friends that are going through something like this. Their loved ones are not cared for or they're they're dying because of money. And we are not talking about someone trying to survive themselves and so they have to do it at the expensive of of another human being. No, we are talking about multi-billion dollar companies. They just want another million. They just want another million. That's why they kill people. That's why they let people die. Contract killers kill people for money. Why is this legal? The whole system is is set up for failure. Our failure, there again. There's more money in treating instead of curing. The incentive should be saving lives. But it's it's not; it's getting away with paying the least amount possible. And then if someone dies, well, if they sue us, we'll pay the settlement. It's cheaper than do the right thing. Until the system is structured this way, this will always happen because because there are some horrible human beings out there. And if you give them the possibility of choosing money over someone they don't know their lives, they will choose money.
Thank you guys for all the love and support. Please keep the prayers going because Bella is far from being out of the woods. Um, if they transfer her tonight, then she will be in the best care that we could possibly ask for. But we still don't know what she has. I hope that we'll find out soon. Thank you all.