Why Natalie Cole Sucks!

April 3, 2009


Natalie Cole was on Larry King Live this week discussing her kidney failure and pitching the general public for an organ donation. I was very eager to hear what she had to say. As you know, celebrities can help raise public awareness and build understanding for important social issues. Michael J. Fox has done a superior job for Parkinson's. Lance Armstrong has done an amazing job for Cancer. Natalie had a rare and important opportunity on LKL. Unfortunately, she blew it.

My expectations for the interview were fairly modest; educate folks about kidney disease and explain the need for organ donors. Instead, what we saw was a very narrow personal perspective, a misrepresentation of many facts, and a minimization of the struggle people face on a daily basis when in kidney failure. Here's a little snippet. There's more of the interview in associated clips.



Statements that pissed me off:

• "If I don't get a kidney, I will be fine." WRONG. Dialysis patients live an average of 7 years. Dialysis patients 60+ years live 4 years. She's 59, BTW. Also, 20% of dialysis patients die every year. Dialysis patients are hospitalized an average of twice a year. Dialysis patients are at risk of heart disease, bone disease, anemia, neurological disorders, infection, blood clots etc. Through the interview, she downplays the difficulties of dialysis and ignores the very real risks.


• "Dialysis interrupts your life, but other than that...You read, you eat, watch TV, and nap."" Oh yeah, what a party. It's one of the biggest myths. People think we bound from the dialysis chair feeling like Superman. BULLSHIT. I've seen people puke, get vicious cramps, pass out, scream in pain, code (go into cardiac arrest), and get carted off in an ambulance. I've seen a senile old lady pull the needles from her arm and spurt blood all over the floor. She could have bled out. Fun for everyone. You are stuck in a chair and cannot move for four hours. Most people can only watch t.v. because their brain completely fogs out. The people I see look like zombies, not like vacationing debutantes. BTW, food is forbidden at my clinic because they're worried we could choke to death.


• "Dialysis takes 3 hours and 15 minutes." FOR HER. The time spent on the dialysis machine varies based on remaining function of the kidney, blood volume, body weight etc. The average dialysis time is 4 hours. Many people are on the machine even longer. Often times you have to wait for a machine. It can take 20 minutes to get on the machine and 20 minutes to get disconnected (sometimes more). There's also travel time to and from the center. So most people are looking at a 6 hour + experience three times a week. This is the part time job you never wanted. It's not merely inconvenient. In fact, it's so difficult that only 23% of people on dialysis work regular jobs.


• "I have the healthiest blood on the planet." WRONG. WRONG. WRONG. Dialysis, at its best, is a substitute for 15% of normal kidney function. She also didn't adequately explain that dialysis not only filters toxins from the blood, but also removes excess fluid from the body that your kidneys can no longer get get rid of. For example, in each dialysis treatment they remove over 6 pounds of fluid from my body in the dialysis process. Imagine losing six pounds in such a short span. Most people feel like dog shit after dialysis. All Ms Cole would have to do to understand this is look around the freaking room the next time she's in dialysis.


• "All dialysis facilities are the same." Wrong again. Here's just one example of a hundred of how they can be different. The facility that I go to discards dialyzers (the blood filter) after use. Other facilities clean their dialyzers with bleach and reuse them when the patient comes back for the next treatment.


• "I have been on dialysis in Istanbul, Milan..." Good for her, but Medicare and most insurance companies will not pay your dialysis costs if you go out of the U.S. BTW, dialysis costs close to 12K a week, or nearly 500k a year. She made no mention of the costs.


• She poo-pooed the National Kidney Foundation for focusing on "prevention." That's just stupid. Prevention can keep most of the 26 million people with kidney disease from progressing to kidney failure.


• "They really don't know what causes kidney failure or how kidneys work." That's absolute nonsense. The kidneys are one one of the best understood organs.

I apologize. I realize this has been a rant. I don't condemn Natalie Cole for how she got kidney failure, many would and do. I don't have an issue with her using celebrity to solicit an organ donor. I don't begrudge her that. Larry King held up a sheaf of people who sent email that they were willing to get tested. I think that's wonderful.

What I don't like is that she was poorly informed and a poor advocate for the rest of us. And that's why Natalie Cole sucks.

If you are interested in learning more about organ donation, please click the graphic above or visit http://www.donatelife.net/.