I’m thankful to be alive. I was supposed to leave this world before I was 10 years old. At least, that’s what the data suggested when I was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF) back in 1997. Much has changed since then. I like to think my own stubbornness, my…

I should’ve died years ago, but I’m too damn competitive. A doctor said I’d cross my high school graduation stage in a wheelchair, toting supplemental oxygen. “Challenge accepted,” I thought. Weeks later, I walked with my head held high and unobstructed by oxygen tubing. When I lost my mind due…

His little ribs rose, then fell, then rose, then fell, then stayed still. The spark left his green, curious eyes — I swear it wasn’t a trick of the light. They were dull … dead. I loathed myself for letting my first cat be put to sleep without me by…

I was fully deaf, too weak to walk across my living room (I couldn’t reach my upstairs bedroom anymore), constantly coughing and vomiting, soaked in sweat and wheezing, too anxious to face friends, under my parents’ 24/7 supervision, without a job other than occasional editing for a local magazine,…

Long-term prognosis of cystic fibrosis (CF) can be anticipated by analyzing a set of 10 genes related to immune response, researchers at National Jewish Health say. These findings were reported in the journal Annals of the American Thoracic Society, in an article titled “Whole Blood Gene Expression Profiling…

Pulmonary hypertension increases the risk of cystic fibrosis patients’ lung function worsening, but is not a predictor of reduced survival, a study reports. The research, ”Prognostic significance of pulmonary hypertension in patients with cystic fibrosis: A systematic review and meta-analysis,” was published in the journal Medicine.