columbus dispatch – 6/12/06 – Betty Montgomery

GUILLAIN-BARRE SYNDROME
Auditor avoids ailment’s worst consequences
Monday, June 12, 2006
Misti Crane
THE COLUMBUS DISPATCH
Ronald Fehring has limited mobility because of a rare nerve disorder closely related to Guillain-Barre Syndrome.
Betty Montgomery is recovering from Guillain-Barre Syndrome.

Ronald Fehring remembers carrying a 100-pound bag of flour the length of a football field. Now, a milk carton is a challenge. He used to plant flowers without a second thought. The impatiens now in front of his Pleasant Township house took him 2 1 /2 hours.

Leekay Bennett has relied on a wheelchair for 27 years and sometimes finds himself short of breath. Bennett, of Delaware, had Guillain-Barre Syndrome, the same disorder that recently befell Betty Montgomery, state auditor and candidate for attorney general.

Fehring, 72, has a closely related nerve disorder, called CIDP, for chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy.

Both are rare and debilitating, at least temporarily. CIDP comes on slowly and lingers. Fehring first noticed tingling sensations. One day, when he was 50, he got out of bed and fell on the floor. In 1995, he had a relapse. He takes steroids and every three weeks undergoes intravenous therapy to boost his immune system.

In contrast to CIPD, Guillain-Barre (ghee-YAN bah-RAY) comes on like a flash and the worst of it usually passes for good, although recovery time can vary widely.

The cause is unknown, but the immune system appears to attack the nervous system. Many cases follow an infection. Montgomery had suffered a respiratory illness.

“It’s just different for everybody,” said Barbara Katzman, associate director of the Guillain-Barre Syndrome Foundation in Pennsylvania. “It takes a toll. It takes time, but most people recover from it.”

Some people have almost no lasting problems. Others have paralysis, lingering fatigue and pain, and breathing problems.

“What I’ve learned is the range of debilitation is remarkable and I have been very blessed,” Montgomery said Friday. “I’m up and walking and I’m out of the hospital after three weeks.

“I have some pain; nothing that’s not manageable.”

Montgomery said she’s trying to rest more to build her stamina and is working from home. She said she plans to return to the office soon, perhaps this week.

On Friday, she saw her doctors and “I danced for them. I just do that to tease them.”

When Guillain-Barre hit, it started with tingling in her fingers and toes. By the next day, her legs felt like noodles and she went to the hospital. Paralysis came on fast, and she needed a ventilator to help her breathe. Even when she was awake, listening to family and friends talk by her bedside, she could not open her eyes.

“When this thing hits you, it hits you like a freight train.”

She knows her recovery was fast. Paralysis faded after a week, and she was walking within two. She credits treatment to replace her plasma and good doctors and rehabilitation staff at Ohio State University Medical Center.

Now, she undergoes physical therapy a couple of hours each week, principally for strength training.

“Just because I’ve had a great recovery doesn’t mean everybody does,” said Montgomery, who has received letters from others about their experience with the syndrome.

“It’s really sobering.”

Bennett, the Delaware woman who had Guillain-Barre, spent months in the hospital followed by months in a nursing home.

She worked hard to regain movement and strength.

“I wanted to hold my kids,” said Bennett, who is 66 and paralyzed from the waist down.

“I say more power to her,” she said of Montgomery. “Her feet, her body is not what we’re voting for. It’s her brain, and for some reason or another that ain’t a muscle and GB doesn’t care for it.”

For more information on Guillain-Barre and CIDP, visit [url]www.gbs-cidp.org[/url]

[email]mcrane@dispatch.com[/email]