Road to Hope for Heyd

The road to Hope for Heyd has been a long and exhausting journey.  Read about how Laura Heyd got to where she is now below.

Starting in 2006 Laura began to show small symptoms of having allergies, so she began to see some allergists. They began running different tests but none were conclusive and didn’t deliver many valuable answers.

In order to better control increasing symptoms, Laura worked with a primary care physician, dietician, physical therapist and chiropractor to try and make her daily life more comfortable.

In 2014, after symptoms began worsening, Laura traveled to Mayo Clinic in Rochester, MN in search of answers to her growing health problems. Again, tests were inconclusive and no solutions were found.

Then in 2015, Laura planned on going to National Jewish Health in Denver, CO. Unfortunately, after further review of her records by the doctor she had been assigned to, they informed her that they were not going to be able to help her as most of the testing they offered had already been completed by Mayo Clinic. On the other hand, after reading updates through Laura’s Go Fund Me campaign, a doctor that had experience with cases like hers reached out in the hopes of helping find a solution to her situation. Under his care, Laura went through elaborate and extensive testing to try and find the underlying causes of her illness. Throughout this time, Laura’s tolerance for foods continued to decrease.

Laura’s new primary care physician spent countless hours researching and reaching out to other specialists all while trying to maintain Laura’s quality of life on the home front through medical trials, diet changes, vitamin supplements and trigger controls.

Although the continued testing did not lead to any exact answers, her new primary care doctor decided to refer her to Riordan Clinic in Wichita, KS. While there Laura underwent more in-depth testing that included genetic and digestive analysis, sensitivity testing and genome sequencing. No definite answers were found but, once again, many conditions and diseases were ruled out.

Laura then went to see an immunologist and also traveled to the KU medical center in hopes of finding better ways to treat her symptoms.

In November 2017, Laura tested positive on an octreoscan, prompting her to see a carcinoid specialist in Denver, CO. Her follow-up scans came back negative but the doctor went ahead and started her on octreotide acetate shot treatments. As of January 2018, she is using this medication to help control flare-ups and symptoms to her reactions. The shots are self-administered 4-5 times a day in the abdomen.