The Road Ahead

Heart BEAT

About Needs & Good Deeds

T

HORNTON, Wash.

- Dennis Nostrant had not been feeling well all day.

It was April 7, 2010. As an engineer for Hardcon Co based in Spokane, he was getting together with county officials, engineers, contractors and subs for a bridge construction project near Kettle Falls in Stevens County.

But when it came time for the site meeting, he had to step behind one of the pickup trucks to throw up. He was shocked to see it was mostly blood.

His liver had stopped functioning and the resulting pressure in the blood stream had caused the veins in his esophagus to burst as part of a condition called "esophageal varices."

He later discovered the underlying cause was cirrhosis and carcinoma (cancer) of the liver. Known as an "end stage" liver condition, the incurable disease is often caused by alcohol abuse. Except in the case of Nostrant, who was no more than an occasional drinker, the culprit is suspected to be blood contamination, either from a transfusion he received after a motorcycle accident in the late 1970s or from a tattoo.

Now, the only way the affable father of two can survive his late 50s is through a liver transplant, requiring very expensive surgery, three months of recovery at the University Of Washington Medical Center in Seattle and a lifetime of life-sustaining drugs.

Nostrant will have to take 37 different medications (including anti-rejection drugs), one of which costs $1,400 a month. The recovery usually takes at least a year and a half.

Despite his insurance's coverage of 80 percent of the bills, Nostrant will face outof pocket expenses totaling up to $350,000.

And the only way he's going to survive that financially is through the fundraising efforts of his own siblings and the generosity of supporters in the Touchet Valley, where he lived for nearly a quarter of a century and which he still considers home.

"The generosity of people here is amazing," said Nostrant, 58, who had a fundraising booth in front of Elk Drug during All Wheels weekend and said even kids would wander over to drop change in the jug.

A big fundraiser for Nostrant - a dinner and silent auction - is planned at the fairgrounds in Waitsburg on Saturday, July 23, from 6 - 8:30 p.m. The cost is $10 for adults and $6 for kids 6-12. Younger kids can come for free.

"The outpouring from people in Dayton, Prescott, Waitsburg and Walla Walla has been phenomenal," said Susan Skeeters, his sister who lives in Prescott and has been organizing local fundraising initiatives.

Asking for this kind of help doesn't come easy for Nostrant, who prides himself on a history of independence from an early age.

"I've held jobs since I was young," he said during an interview at his 1888 farm house in Thornton, about 40 miles south of Spokane. "It's been really humbling."

Nostrant and his seven siblings grew up in the Yakima Valley, where their father worked for a large regional construction company.

In the late 1979, when Nostrant lived in the Tri Cities and worked as a teamster/ job foreman for a different construction company, he was struck by a car while riding his Harley Davidson in Kennewick. The accident broke his legs in 400 places and he was forced to recover in a cast from the waist down. This was the period when he received a number of blood transfusions that could have been tainted.

Making the best of his new situation, he went to back to school (at first in a wheelchair) and two years later obtained an engineering degree from Columbia Basin College. During and after his recovery, he began visiting his parents who had moved to Dayton while his father worked on the construction of the Columbia County Transfer Station.

After he had a chance to go hunting and fishing in the Blue Mountains, Nostrant decided Dayton was the place for him and moved there in 1981.

He bought the former Sports Center tavern in Dayton (now Woody's) that same year and worked for nine years as a volunteer fire fighter for the city while doing engineering projects on the side.

In 1991, when he joined Hardcon as a fulltime engineer, he moved to Waitsburg, from where he coordinated a number of projects in the region, including work on several of the Snake River dams, the Touchet school remodel and the new Milton Freewater Aquatic Center.

The two daughters he helped raise in Waitsburg are the main reason he's mustering up the courage to go through with the risky liver transplant.

Lola is 19 and in her first year at WSU, hoping to become a veterinarian, while Kellie, 14, just finished eighth grade and lives with her mom in Cove, Ore.

"That, in a nutshell, is my motivation to give this the best shot I can," he said. "Those girls are my entire life and I'd like to see them grow up. They're amazing young ladies."

When they get together in the summer or other times of year, the three go hunting, fishing and camping, "laugh and tell jokes together," Nostrant said. Last week, his daughters were picking cherries to help raise money for their dad.

The deterioration of Nostrant's liver is measured on a scale from 1 to 47, the biggest number being the worst. Currently, he's a 22 and rising. He recently went through a second "banding" treatment to address his esophageal varices and undergoes chemotherapy for the cancer.

He continues to work for Hardcon, which provides him a full-time paycheck despite his absences recovering from the chemo or when he's overcome with fatigue and "hits a wall."

Skeeters said patients like Nostrant go through phases that include denial, depression and what she called the "yes I can" stage in which her brother finds himself now.

" He's pretty positive about it," she said. "This isn't just for him, but for his daughters."

Donations for Nostrant's treatment are funneled through the National Transplant Assistant Fund, a nonprofit that makes contributions tax deductible. The first goal is to raise $10,000 as a down payment on his threemonth residency at the UW Medical Center.

For more information, call Susan Skeeters at 509-629- 2568.