About Home Infusion > Patient Stories

Through their eyes

Living with Home Infusion

These individuals have persevered their circumstances and leveraged home infusion to maintain independence, activity, and normalcy during treatment. We are grateful to be able to share these stories so others can understand what home infusion looks like through the eyes of those receiving treatment, what it means to them and how it has been a part of their often incredible journeys.

If you or someone you know would like to share a personal experience with home infusion therapy, please reach out to communications@nhia.org.

I’ve been able to live the way I live because of the teams. It really does take a village in health care. Everyone works together for the patient. It matters what each person does because if any one part doesn’t work right, the whole thing doesn’t work.

For many patients on home parenteral nutrition (PN), the therapy modality is the result of a sustained chronic illness. While it’s less than ideal to rely on life-sustaining nutrition support, when it’s well calibrated for the patient, PN can offer a modicum of clinical stability and even independence on an otherwise long and difficult journey.

My pharmacist and dietitian take really good care of me—they call every week to check on my progress and my supplies. We’ve built a rapport. And they do a great job of communicating with my doctor and the home care company. I was even able to transfer my care to the home infusion company’s office in Virginia when I went to visit my daughter for a few weeks.

Imagine your Gl tract suddenly stopped functioning. That happened to Amanda, who lives with gastroparesis. Diagnosing the problem and landing on an effective treatment is a journey Amanda says she “wouldn’t wish on my worst enemy.”

l would like for the kind of thing that happened to me not to happen to other people—especially those people who don’t know that they can fight, or don’t know how.

Independence is highly valued among patients with chronic medical conditions, and home infusion therapy plays a significant role in supporting that independence. Unfortunately, changes in coverage policies and unpredictable fluctuations in out-of-pocket costs can introduce barriers and create uncertainty, turning many patients into advocates.

As my condition improved, I was able to resume normal activities and just integrate the administration into my routine. Going somewhere everyday would have been much more disruptive and traumatic. Home infusion makes a lot of sense.

Serious infections can sideline the best of plans. That’s what happened to Jusup, a Montana-based YouTuber with the ambitious goal of running a 100-mile race through the Salmon River mountains of Idaho. “I had never even raced in a 5K,” he recalls, “but, I was progressing in my goal of running at least 2 miles every day for a year and thought it would be a good test.”

The views expressed herein are solely the views of the individual and are not necessarily representative of NHIA or the home infusion community.