In the summer of 2024, Discover Humboldt brought readers the story of the Crawley family and courageous Emma’s courageous health battle brought on by complications with her liver.
The Crawleys migrated to Edmonton for medical care while Emma was tended to at the Stollery Children’s Hospital. Emma awaited a liver donor, and as her condition fluctuated, the on-again off-again surgery hung over the family like a cloud.
Through it all, Emma’s mom, Megan Crawley watched and waited, hoping for a positive outcome. She was not alone. Family members like Janessa Britz launched a Go Fund Me campaign and publicized their plight to encourage both donations and testing for liver matches.
Humboldt and area responded in a big way, helping to offset the financial strain of repeated trips and life at Ronald McDonald House in Edmonton.
As previously reported, family member Emily Britz stepped in as a living donor match, the tenth individual to submit to testing to be a life saver for little Emma. Despite her wavering health, surgeons elected to go ahead with the procedure. Other than some shaky post-operative moments, Emma’s recovery has been remarkable, says Megan Crawley.
“Emma did miraculously get well enough to have the surgery, and so Emily, and her husband Jeremy, and her parents and siblings, her workplace, her doctor, and everyone was willing to rally behind her so she could come to Edmonton when she was needed. It’s the whole community who was in behind this.”
In another serendipitous community connection, Dr. Astrid Lang attended with the family during Emma’s trials and was the physician who discharged Emma from the hospital. Dr. Lang originally hails from the Muenster area, and she contributed strongly to that community “wrap-around” of care.
With Emma home in Saskatoon and continuing to make strong progress in her recovery, an opportunity presented itself to give to a cause that would support families facing similar infant health crises in the future.
“It all comes back to the Humboldt area. Janessa Britz reached out to Kim Berscheid, also from the Humboldt area, who is a transplant coordinator with the adult population.”
Berscheid took the initiative to see what resources might be available to the Crawley Family given the patient was an infant. Sadly, Kim reported back that there was nothing available through their funding channels.
However, they did uncover an organization, Move for Life Foundation, who provided resources in Ontario for a youth population. It was a matter of creating their own grant through the Move for Life organization that would be available to Saskatchewan residents.
“Kim got a group of people together, and we did a walk and talk event last October in Saskatoon and Regina. All those funds have been designated toward pediatric transplant families this year. This was all spearheaded a year ago, and here we are.”
The application window for this year’s Saskatchewan Move for Life Grant for Pediatric Transplant Funding is now open from May 1-30, 2025. Details are in the poster below.
The next fundraising opportunity for the grant happens with the support of SARCAN. You can drop off your returnables to SARCAN’s Drop and Go service, and by using the code “M4LF,” you can direct the proceeds to the grant foundation.
The remarkable story of life, celebration and community generosity continues. Enjoy our full conversation with Megan Crowley below.