Eastport couple hope to get dialysis center

EASTPORT – A Washington County couple is lobbying for a kidney dialysis center closer to Down East residents.

Ellsworth or Bangor are the closest sites for people who need treatment. For some, the trips are more than two hours each way.

So Omar and Eleanor Norton of Eastport recently began an effort to provide a kidney dialysis treatment center in their area after they found that some of their neighbors had to drive so far several times a week.

“We have so many acquaintances just here in town who … have to go to Ellsworth, the nearest place, for three days. They might be on the Monday-Wednesday-Friday schedule,” she said. “That’s a 100-mile ride from this area, then go through a three- to four-hour dialysis procedure, and then back, rest a day and back to Ellsworth again.

“Somehow it just seems so unfair that Washington County couldn’t have something closer,” Eleanor Norton said.

When the Nortons began their research, they said, they did not care which community would house such a center so long as it was in Washington County. A trip from Lubec to Eastport is about 30 minutes. From Princeton, Eastport is little more than an hour away.

Eventually, they concluded that Dr. Shahid Mansoor, an Eastport-based nephrologist, would be the ideal person to oversee the project.

The couple next met with the Maine project manager for Fresenius Medical Care North America, Jerry Lelime of Westbrook. Fresenius Medical runs the nation’s largest network of dialysis clinics and manufactures dialysis products, according to the Web site of the company, based in Lexington, Mass.

Since a normally functioning kidney separates waste and excess fluid from a person’s blood, dialysis was developed as a way to do the job when a kidney doesn’t work properly.

The Nortons also talked with developer Hardy Banfield of Kennebunk, who said he might be willing to build a facility in Eastport to house the treatment center. Eleanor Norton said the facility would not be connected to the Eastport Healthcare Center.

City Manager George “Bud” Finch said the city councilors are much in favor of the project. “We are very excited about the possibility. Eastport and eastern Washington County have a number of dialysis patients who have to go to Ellsworth, Bangor and beyond on a very regular basis, and we are very excited about the opportunity to work with Fresenius Medical Care of North America,” he said.

A meeting to demonstrate support for such a facility has been scheduled for 7 tonight in the band room at Shead High School.

Finch said the project manager and a vice president for Fresenius will be at the meeting to answer questions. He said there was enough bare land in Eastport to build such a facility.

“Anybody who feels that such an operation could benefit them or their family members or neighbors should come down and understand what we are trying to do,” Finch said.