Campus Unites Around Ailing Cal Volleyball Player
BERKELEY (CBS SF) – It should be the best of times for Cal freshman volleyball player Savannah Rennie.
Growing up in San Diego, she dreamed of one day playing college volleyball and those dreams came true in 2015.
She took extra classes so she could graduate from high school early and then headed off to UC-Berkeley in the Spring of 2015 to join the team.
All seemed to be going well until she fell ill after a workout.
Rennie had headache, felted nauseated, her body ached and she had a fever. The doctors thought she simply had a bad case of the flu.
For more than a week, the symptoms persisted. There were more trips to Urgent Care until doctors discovered her spleen and liver were enlarged and she was hospitalized.
More time passed, more tests were taken, more time in the hospital. Then the diagnosis came.
Rennie was suffering from Congential Hepatic Fibrosis with Portal Hypertension – an uncommon condition for someone her age.
Treatment with drugs failed and now she needs a life-saving liver transplant.
Last night, her image was flashed on the massive scoreboard at the Cal-UCLA men's basketball game and a roar went up from the sellout crowd.
She tweeted on Friday.
Rennie is currently on the transplant list at the University of Indiana hospital in Indianapolis. At any moment, the call could come and she would be in the hospital and awaiting the transplant.
A gofundme page has been set up if you want to help her family with expenses. So far the community has raised $58,806.
