Don Downey

PHA Canada is delighted to welcome Don Downey as the latest Ambassador. Don, along with his wife, Kathy, is a longtime PH advocate.
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Don’s wife Kathy started noticing issues with being out of breath in December 2015, although her issues probably date back even further. After over four years of going back and forth for appointments with her GP and specialists with no cause diagnosis, Kathy had an episode and ended up in the ER. While there, the ER doctor showed her a lab report on her file from September 2017, and she sent a copy to Don to have a physician friend look at it. Don asked the physician if there were any questions Kathy should ask the ER doctor. He looked at it for less than a minute and said, “Ask him why you have pulmonary hypertension.”

This triggered several tests being done, and very shortly after that, Kathy received a firm diagnosis of severe idiopathic pulmonary arterial hypertension. Don and Kathy can’t know if a diagnosis in 2017 would have prevented her case from being as severe as it was at diagnosis in March 2020. The realization that many doctors don’t necessarily know to look for PH as a possible cause of a patient’s symptoms made Don want to investigate a way to change it so that others don’t go undiagnosed for long periods, even when the signs are all there.

Don is excited about being an Ambassador for PHA Canada and working towards increasing awareness about PH to help both current and future PH patients.