Gerald “Jerry” (MSU, 1976) and Julie Abraham are turning a lifetime of health struggles into positive impact with a new scholarship to the MSU College of Nursing. The Abrahams are dedicating a $500,000 endowment to support nursing students who desire to serve as advocates for their patients.
Julie and Jerry have seen their fair share of hospital rooms during their marriage. Julie has spent most of her life battling pancreatitis, primary biliary cholangitis (PBC), and their related complications. Checking into the hospital for a pancreatic flare up became the norm for Julie and Jerry. Julie recalls their family found a routine with the hospital stays with the help of Julie’s gastroenterologist nurse, Margo, who was always her first call when she or Jerry had questions.
“For about nine years, I would have to go into the hospital every six weeks,” said Julie. Through all the hospital trips, Julie and Jerry maintained a great rapport with the medical professionals. The nurses made a deep impact on their family, offering empathy and education whenever they needed it.
“The education we received from the nurses was huge,” said Jerry. “It wasn’t just the patient they were teaching; they also taught their support and family.”
A day finally arrived when Julie would receive a Whipple procedure, meant to remove a dying portion of her pancreas. Five days after the successful procedure, Julie was not getting pain relief as she should and realized the pump delivering pain medication had turned off.
“I was in excruciating pain. I tried to keep telling people that I was in pain, but it didn’t register with anyone that the pump was off,” said Julie.
Enter Bernice, a long-time nurse covering Julie’s recovery unit. Bernice corrected the malfunctioning pain pump, and she took extra time to offer emotional support. Bernice stayed in Julie’s room for two hours calming her down from the depressing pain.
“Without her support and understanding, I may not have made it through that day,” said Julie.
After the procedure, Julie began seeking new ways to manage her recovery and health. In addition to traditional medicine she received from her long-time primary care team, she began working with Dr. Dorothy (Robin) Pedtke (D.O., 1999) at the Born Clinic, owned by Dr. Tammy Born Huizenga (D.O., 1986). There Dr. Pedtke and Dr. Born Huizenga began to administer functional medicine to Julie. Dr. Pedtke noticed that Julie’s traditional gastroenterology testing was not offering insight to why Julie was feeling weak, despite maintaining Whipple-safe fitness regiments.
“I and everyone assumed that my symptoms were just complications from the Whipple,” said Julie. “Robin decided to do new testing to see how my body was accepting nutrients.”
This round of testing, coupled with her regular blood testing, revealed that Julie’s PBC had worsened after several years, only being exposed by nutrient testing.
Julie received a liver transplant on October 31, 2015 at Indiana University (IU) Health University Hospital. While in the hospital recovering, Michigan State football was playing the University of Maryland. Julie requested that she be updated as frequently as possible on the score of the football game, which the nurses happily obliged to.
Julie was having additional follow-up procedures completed. “Before I woke up from the procedure, the nurses wrote the score of that week’s game on my wristband,” said Julie. “They even wrote it on the white board in my room for everyone because I kept asking about it each time I woke up.”
Julie and Jerry continue to manage all these health concerns with the assistance of physicians and nurses across the state. A nurse at her primary care office, named Kathy, is always ready to take her call when she or Jerry have questions.
“Kathy taught me how to do it all [managing pancreatitis at home] with as little struggle as possible,” said Julie.
Jerry and Julie want to continue preparing future nurses to advocate for their patients through education and support. They benefitted greatly from the empathy offered by Bernice, the attentiveness offered by the IU Health University Hospital staff, and the education offered by every nurse they’ve interacted with. The scholarship will help them pay that support forward. Beginning in the 2025-26 academic year, students who display the same advocacy as those closest to the Abrahams will receive the Gerald and Julie Abraham Family Scholarship in Nursing.
Through all the struggles they faced, Julie and Jerry know that “nursing will always be there.”