TEMPE, AZ — A rare autoimmune disease hospitalized a Tempe woman intermittently over a year and a half — but it also set her on a new path toward medical school.
Delaney Nothaft was diagnosed with myasthenia gravis, or MG, during her senior year playing Division I tennis at Santa Clara University.
The chronic condition, affecting an estimated 37 out of every 100,000 people in the U.S., causes the immune system to attack the nerve-muscle connection.
"For a long time it was really debilitating for me and can be really debilitating for lots of people," Delaney said.
The diagnosis forced Delaney to return home to Tempe, where she was hospitalized roughly every three weeks over a year and a half, according to her mother, Keira, with most visits being in the ICU.
"It was so scary not knowing if she was ever gonna be able to have any kind of a normal life," Keira said.
MG can manifest in different ways; for Delaney, it means chronic fatigue and difficulty eating, breathing, speaking, and seeing. At times, the condition left her winded to the point of needing a machine to breathe and a wheelchair to move around.
During those hospital stays, Delaney found herself enamored with the conversations doctors had with medical students gathered around her bed. When they left to check on the next patient, she wanted to tag along to see what was happening in the neighboring rooms.
That was when Delaney knew she had found her calling.
"What's really stopping me from doing it? I can always try," Delaney said.
She began studying while undergoing transfusions, with an IV still in her arm, and later landed a job as a medical scribe at the clinic treating her.
"It really solidified why I want to go into medicine," Delaney said. "I love hearing patients' stories and hearing what they've been able to overcome."
Now, after becoming one of 15 MG patients nationwide to receive a scholarship from the pharmaceutical company UCB, Delaney is pursuing a new dream: medical school at UCLA this semester, to eventually care for people with the same compassion she received from doctors whom she and her mother fervently described as heroes.
"She's just come so far," Keira said through tears. "I really say, you just never bet against Delaney."
