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Locals kick in for Kirk
POCATELLO -- It was less than half a year ago when Kirk MacAllister started losing sensation from his waist down.
In trying to discover the cause, MacAllister underwent five MRIs -- just one covered by insurance -- and chemotherapy and other treatments which were found to be unnecessary because the diagnosis was incorrect. Finally, a specialist at the Mayo Clinic in Phoenix provided a new diagnosis and cause for optimism. MacAllister, a Boise resident who once lived in Pocatello, has a rare disease called Longitudinal Transverse Myelitis. It afflicts one in 5 million people and attacks the spine and nervous system, but it's much less sinister than his original diagnosis of Neuromyelitis Optica.
Though the outlook is good for MacAllister to live a full life, he and his wife have been overwhelmed by medical bills. To help, friends in Pocatello have organized a local fundraiser, a concert and dinner scheduled to start at 3 p.m. Sunday at Courtesy Ford. Cost of admission will be $25. Food will be available from Remo's and Mama Inez for a minimal fee, and music will feature Joe Cannon of Sun Valley, and Eaton and Sanders from Pocatello. A host of prizes, including a trip to a San Diego Chargers football game, will be raffled.
MacAllister learned of the fundraiser a few days ago, but he's not well enough to travel and will have to miss it. "I feel pretty lucky to have such great friends, and certainly the people in Pocatello have reached out and been as gracious as you can get,"
MacAllister said. "This has been a blessing to have everybody do this." About a third of the time, patients with the rare disease make full recoveries. But some patients are also left with major disabilities. In MacAllister's case, the disease attacked the sheath surrounding the nerves in his second to seventh vertebras. It causes the nerves to misfire.
MacAllister has felt much better since chemotherapy treatments ended about three weeks ago. "It's left me numb from the waist down. Strangely enough you do get used to it and you learn to do things with that numbness," MacAllister said. "It's still a pretty strange feeling."
MacAllister was the general manager of the Pocatello Golf and Country Club, now called Juniper Hills, from 1981 to 1983. He then left Pocatello for Boise, where he got to know a host of former Gate City residents. He and his wife had been running a business together called Service Insite in which they served as travel directors. MacAllister has had to stop working due to his illness, but his wife has continued planning trips for clients. While in Pocatello, MacAllister befriended Bob "Hornet" Thronson, now the owner of Remo's. They were roommates for a few years, and they've been best friends for almost 40 years.
Before working at the country club, MacAllister helped start the Sandpiper Restaurant, 1400 Bench Road, and got Thronson a job waiting tables, introducing him to the restaurant business. Thronson was among the many organizers of the fundraiser.
"We're just trying to raise some money to keep him in his house and keep him going," Thronson said. Anther longtime Pocatello friend, Phil Meador, said Cannon played at a benefit in Las Vegas for MacAllister and did very well. Meador said the Pocatello event organizers are also expecting a strong turnout and have been planning the fundraiser for about five weeks.
"He's probably one of the healthiest people I know in terms of staying in shape and eating right and being very health-conscious," Meador said. "When this thing surfaced it was just a lightning bolt out of the sky." By John O'Connell joconnell@journalnet.com Article RatingReader CommentsSubmit a CommentCommenting RulesWe encourage your feedback and dialog. All comments are subject to deletion by our Web staff.
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