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Basket Raffles, Gun Raffles, Bags Tournament, 50/50, and more to help out Jessica Kussman’s family with medical bills.Jessica Kussman is a devoted registered nurse, wife, and mother of three who has faced many significant health challenges due to epilepsy, a condition that has significantly impacted her personal and professional life. Jessica’s passion lies in nursing, particularly in labor and delivery and home health care, where she has cared deeply for both newborns and home health patients. However, beginning in December 2018, Jessica experienced her first grand mal seizure while working as a home health nurse. Despite extensive testing that initially showed no clear cause, her seizures progressively worsened over the years.
By 2022, the increasing frequency and severity of her seizures forced Jessica to resign from her labor and delivery position, a role she cherished deeply. Although she continued working in home health nursing, the unpredictability and frequency of her seizures—ranging from 5 to 15 per week by late 2023—made it unsafe and impractical for her to work with newborns as well as maintaining her previous workload.
In December 2023, Jessica suffered a life-threatening episode known as status epilepticus, a continuous seizure state that required emergency hospitalization at UW Madison Hospital. She was placed in a medically induced coma for approximately 21 days. She was hospitalized for about a month total during this time. This critical event brought immense uncertainty and emotional strain to Jessica and her family, who feared she might not recover.
Throughout her employment, Jessica had been paying into short- and long-term disability insurance through her employer. However, after her company was acquired in mid-2023, she was required to reapply for her position. Due to her pre-existing epilepsy diagnosis, she was deemed ineligible for disability benefits, leaving her and her family in a difficult financial position during a time when she was unable to work.
In 2024, Jessica pursued advanced treatment with the implantation of a responsive neurostimulation (RNS) device designed to detect and reduce seizure activity. Although she experienced a postoperative infection necessitating removal of the device in July 2024, she was fortunate to have it re-implanted in November 2024- this making it a total of 3 brain surgeries in 2024. Currently, Jessica manages her condition with the active RNS device and a regimen of five anti-seizure medications. While her seizure frequency has improved significantly—from multiple seizures weekly to about five per month—these episodes still prevent her from returning to work at this time.
Currently, Jessica has 5 different types of seizures that have been identified at this time. Her healthcare team is still uncertain to what is causing these episodes but are working tirelessly to try and get her back to a more manageable life style without having so many seizure episodes and to reduce her anti-seizure medicine as the anti-seizure medicine has different side affects that have impacted her as well.
Jessica remains hopeful that with ongoing treatment and support, she will one day return to her true passion: caring for mothers and their newborns along with going back to doing home health care and providing care to patients in the comfort of their own home.
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504 N Holmen Dr, Holmen, WI, United States
