Help Jayne Have Surgery in America to Fix Her Rib Condition

For the past 2 years, Jayne has been living in excruciating pain from a rare condition called Slipping Rib Syndrome. She lives in constant pain and has to travel to the USA to have surgery to fix this condition. We are raising money to help her pay for the surgery and travel to the USA.

Slipping Rib Syndrome is a rare condition where some of her ribs have detached from the cartilage and are no longer attached to anything at the front of the ribcage. The tip of the ribs stab her insides causing constant daily pain, stopping her from moving and doing much.

She had a grueling time trying to find out what was wrong. Because it’s so uncommon, the doctors didn’t know what to look for, and thus the tests and scans all came back normal. It was finally diagnosed via dynamic ultrasound 1.5 years after the injury.

Unfortunately finding a surgeon who can operate on it has also been difficult. Normally to fix this condition, a cardio thoracic surgeon will remove the affected ribs which of course can never grow back, and can often cause long term complications.

Ribs are broken away on both sides of Jayne's body, so we didn’t want to accept that invasive and temporary solution as the only way to fix it.

After doing copious research, we discovered that there is a a single surgeon globally who specialises in this condition, and has invented a procedure to stabilise the rib cage, bypassing the nerves so they don’t become trapped. He has done this surgery many times, with very successful outcomes. The only problem is that he lives in West Virginia, USA.

After a lot of research, and countless emails and phone calls, Jayne has decided to take the plunge and head to America to have the surgery. The pain she has because of her ribs is debilitating - she has to take intense pain medication every day and can’t function properly anymore. Nobody should have to live like that. So even though covid-19 is a real threat in America at the moment, she’s booked in to have the surgery on both sides of her ribs at once.

America has a user-pays health system, not like in New Zealand, so unfortunately it’s going to cost a lot of money to get over there and to have the surgery.

Before her injuries, Jayne was a professional dancer, performing in shows and festivals around both NZ and overseas, doing martial arts classes, and teaching fitness and stretch classes. Before her injuries, she was incredibly physically active.

As you can imagine she has had to completely change her lifestyle. While she owns and runs a dance studio called Studio L'amour, now she has been forced to hire other teachers to run her various classes. She also works part time in an office, but even sitting puts a lot of pressure on her ribs so she can’t sit down for too long.

Although Jayne is currently not able to teach the physical courses, her studio not only empowers women through dance, but also produces shows that allow her students to truly shine. She has helped so many people become more confident and happy through dance. She has helped the local community so much by giving performers work and providing local entertainment. She has done so much for the community, and now it's time for us to help her.

Some other people that have this condition can’t work at all or function much past lying flat for most of the day. Jayne refuses to let this happen to her and is determined to have this surgery to fix her so she and her family can return to a new normal and have some of her life back.

Any amount of money raised will help towards the costs of the flights, accommodation, and surgery.

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this, and please share this page far and wide!

If you'd like to read more about Jayne's journey with her ribs, please read this blog she's written to help raise more awareness about this rare condition: https://jaynesribs.blogspot.com/