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 Health & Beauty | June 2006 
Paralyzed Physically, Financially in Mexico
 Jesse White - Mesabi Daily News
| | Broken Column by Frida Kahlo |
Barely able to speak and unable to hold the telephone in his own hand, Dale Lustig struggled to explain his situation to the voice on the other end of the line.
His wife Tammy and two pilots waiting to fly him to the United States stood near his bed in a hospital in Mexico as Lustig made call after call to his credit card companies in search of higher limits and quick cash.
To leave the country, Lustig needed money. And not just a little money — he needed $90,000.
A body surfing accident in the ocean off a beach in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, had left him paralyzed from the chest area down, and after an emergency operation to un-compress his spine, Lustig needed to return to Minnesota to begin his long road to recovery.
But officials at the hospital weren't going to let him leave without paying the bill, even though he was fully insured through an American company.
“They wouldn't accept any insurance card from the United States. I had to come up with the cash and my credit cards approved it,” Lustig said. “They weren't going to go through dealing with the insurance. They saw the American there and said ‘you pay.’”
Lustig, 56, is originally from Virginia but moved about 35 years ago.
After graduating from high school here he joined the military and after his service he moved to the Twin Cities area.
He then moved to Duluth, where he runs a business with a partner, about four years ago after meeting his wife Tammy, who is a registered nurse at St. Mary's Medical Center. She is originally from Parkville.
In late March, the Lustigs decided to take a vacation in Puerto Vallarta and the accident that changed his live happened on his first full day of the trip.
The pair were on the beach when Lustig decided to go body surfing on a rented boogie board, a water toy similar to a surfboard that you lay on and is smaller.
“I decided to do it because I had done that before,” he said.
After five or six trips on the board, Lustig suggested to his wife that they move further down the beach where, “the waves looked bigger.”
On his second trip out, tragedy struck.
Lustig said he caught his wave and was coming in — getting within about 20 feet of shore — when another wave came down on him, thrusting his body down onto the ocean floor.
He was in about two feet of water and the force of the wave pushed him face first into the sand and caused his neck to snap back.
Lustig said he ended up getting eight stitches in his face from a plastic surgeon but that was the least of his problems.
He also fractured his spinal cord, compressed it and ended up paralyzed from the chest down.
“I hit the bottom and came up. I could see the shore but I couldn't get up. My legs wouldn't work but my arms would,” Lustig said. “I was trying to collect myself but the waves would come in and drag me back out.”
Eventually, someone from the beach heard his yells for help and pulled him to shore.
The first person to his side just happened to be a doctor from Rochester, Minn., Lustig said.
“I was laying on the beach and my leg was up and a doctor came up and told me to move my leg, but I couldn't,” Lustig said.
Two more individuals came to his side and, ironically, they were both interns studying to become doctors. All three of the medical experts knew immediately there was something seriously wrong.
“They were holding my neck tight and it's probably a good thing they were there. It was just good luck,” he said.
He was transferred to a Mexican hospital soon after, arriving at about noon.
The first order of business was an MRI. The doctor then told him he needed immediate surgery because his spinal cord was compressed and there was no room for swelling.
He also couldn't be moved without the surgery, so at 2 a.m. the operation began. The procedure made room for the spinal cord to swell and a metal plate with eight screws was placed in his upper back area.
Lustig said the doctor who operated on him did a good job and that the hospital was new and clean but the staff was a problem.
He was scheduled to stay three days for evaluation before a transfer but pushed to get out in two days, due mostly to the treatment he was getting.
“All the nurses would say they didn't speak English but they did,” he said, adding that one night the only nurse on duty was sound asleep at her desk while he sat in the darkness. “I was afraid to stay in the hospital by myself.”
Lustig and his family pushed to get him out early and they were successful in the petition. However, getting permission to leave and leaving were two different things.
He was scheduled to take an air ambulance to Houston and then to Duluth, but before he could go officials at the hospital told him he would have to come up with the money to pay for services rendered.
“The difficult part of Mexico is I had to come up with all the money before they would let me leave,” Lustig said. “The whole bill was $90,000 and I had to pay for the flight up front, which was $31,000.”
So with two pilots on stand-by in his room and his wife at his side he did the only thing he could — he called several credit card companies and asked them to raise his limits to he could buy his way home.
“You can get stuck down there. I happened to have the means to do that (get out),” he said.
Lustig said the credit card bills have started to come due now and he has submitted them to his insurance company but he doesn't know how much they will cover, if any.
Meanwhile, some of Lustig’s former classmates from the Virginia High School Class of 1965 have set up a benefit account at Queen City Federal Savings and Loan to help him pay some of his out-of-pocket expenses.
“It’s always nice to have support and have people thinking about you,” Lustig said.
Lustig is an in-patient at Miller Dwan Rehabilitation Center and is in his eighth week of rehab.
Things are looking positive.
“I've seen significant improvement. It's coming along good according to the therapist and the doctor," he said.
The paralysis originally started from the chest down but since he entered he has started getting some slight movement in his lower legs and his hands are working better. His grip is getting stronger and he has hope for the future.
But doctors haven't made any promises.
“They don't know. They don't know if I'll be able to walk in my life,” Lustig said. “I know I won't walk like I did. Maybe I'll walk with crutches. Hopefully I'll be able to walk to some degree. But to have a full recovery, I don't know what the chances are ... but it's possible."
He said he has another week or two left at Miller Dwan before he is sent home. After that he becomes a day patient.
“I try to stay optimistic. I guess I've been accused of looking too far down the road and I need to focus on the short term instead of thinking about getting out there and playing second base,” Lustig said. “It's a life-changing experience by any stretch of the imagination but they are working on me. Hopefully I'll be mobile enough to get out of this wheel chair to some degree.”
Anyone interested in helping Lustig and his family can send a donation to: Dale Lustig Benefit Account, c/o Queen City Federal Savings and Loan, P.O. Box 1147, Virginia, MN, 55792. Please make checks payable to: Dale Lustig Benefit Account. |
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