After
George Leuzzi pays final respects to his wife on Tuesday at her
funeral, he will turn his attention to caring for their young daughter
and bringing an end to a procedure that claimed 44-year-old Brenda.
"Now
that she's passed I will do my part to carry on what she started," he
said. "I will help as much as I can to get this removed."
Brenda Leuzzi died 25 months after fibroid surgery through minimally invasive procedure that involved power morcellation.
At the time, no one knew the fibroids, thought to be innocent growths,
were cancerous. There is no definitive pre-surgery test to determine
whether fibroids are benign. Power morcellation shreds tissue so that it
can be removed through small incisions of minimally invasive surgery.
In so doing, it can send bits of cancer to other parts of the abdomen,
where they can "seed."
A grassroots effort to end power
morcellation has been going on for just about a year, since the problem
was brought to light by a physician whose wife had an undetected cancer
worsened by the procedure.
The Food and Drug Administration has
issued advisories against the procedure and the leading manufacturer,
Johnson & Johnson, has asked providers to return the devices. But
other manufacturers have them on the market. The FDA held hearings in
July about the safety of the procedure.
The same day that George
Leuzzi buried his wife, Morgan Liscinsky of the FDA press office
answered a request for an update with, "I have no new information to
share since you contacted me last month."
Sens. Chuck Schumer and
Kirsten Gillibrand wrote in August to FDA Commissioner Margaret Hamburg.
That letter was on behalf of Jim Leary of Greece, whose wife, Barbara,
died last year after having undergone a procedure that involved
morcellation.
Asked what the senators are doing to step up
pressure, Gillibrand spokesman Jacob Fromer responded: "It is deeply
frustrating to the Senator that while the FDA discourages the use of
these very devices they won't take the necessary action to ban them. She
will continue to communicate her concerns to the commissioner.
Kirsten's thoughts and prayers are with the Leuzzi family, particularly
their young daughter, Peyton."
Schumer spokesman Max Dworin said
the office "followed up with the FDA (Monday), urging them again to call
on manufacturers to voluntarily recall these devices, and we will
continue to push."
Schumer's statement Monday read, ""The passing
of Brenda Leuzzi is tragic and further underscores the urgency for all
firms to voluntarily recall these devices until more thorough testing
can be done. The FDA should act before another family has to experience
what the Leuzzi family is going through right now. My thoughts and
prayers go out to the entire Leuzzi family."
George Leuzzi is more
adamant than Schumer. "I'm very disappointed in the FDA. They should
have banned this by now. They're just stalling and finding some other
way to convince themselves it's OK. If anybody saw Brenda and the way
she died, it's pretty far from OK. I wouldn't wish it on my worst
enemy."
George Leuzzi said he's received an uncountable number of
texts and emails since he posted on a leiomyosarcoma Facebook page news
of Brenda's death.
"Cancer is the enemy, but any procedure that
would enhance it and make it worse and put someone in a position to have
no way of rebounding from it is criminal," he said.
As it was during Brenda's illness, her husband's focus is on his wife.
"I
want her to be remembered. I don't want her to be forgotten, especially
because what she died for was completely unnecessary."
No comments:
Post a Comment