By Diana Samuels
Times-Picayune
NEW ORLEANS — Larry Lehmann, a New Orleans lawyer, was in Monroe a few months ago, visiting a client. That day, a man in Monroe who needed a kidney transplant learned there was an available organ waiting for him in New Orleans.
Lehmann put the man on his small airplane and they flew to the city.
“It was like ‘Drop everything, be here in five hours,’ ” Lehmann said. “Well, we had him there in three.”
Lehmann, a flying enthusiast, is a board member and volunteer for Pilots for Patients, a Louisiana nonprofit group that organizes pilots to provide free transportation for those who need to get to hospitals or other medical centers across the South.
“A lot of times people can’t get the care they need in the city that they live in,” Lehmann said.
He and Philip Thomas, a client and friend who lives in Monroe, were active in Angel Flight, a nationwide volunteer pilots’ organization. But it seemed to them that the national group was not giving Louisianians sufficient attention, so they decided to start their own organization.
“Louisiana being second from the bottom for health care, we felt there was a need to help people . . . to go out for a second opinion, or a third opinion,” Thomas said.
Pilots for Patients flew its first mission in January. It has now logged more than 120 flights and has about 35 volunteer pilots. They generally keep flights to less than 350 miles, but they can add additional legs to a flight or link up with other organizations if necessary.
The organization is based in Monroe with Thomas, the group’s president, though Lehmann hopes to sign up more New Orleans pilots.
“Some people, they have (small airplanes) and they like to fly, but they have really nothing to do other than go out for the proverbial ‘hundred-dollar hamburger,’ ” Lehmann said. “This gives them something where they can use their skills to give something back. To make a difference.”
Pilots donate the fuel for the trips, which can cost hundreds of dollars depending on distance, Lehmann said. The cost of the trips is tax deductible.
Pilots are required to have 250 hours of flight time, and, since the planes are not air ambulances, a doctor must declare patients medically stable before they can fly. Patients and their traveling companions also must sign waivers before flying. Pilots for Patients has dealt with nothing worse than bad weather and canceled flights, but three Angel Flight missions were involved in fatal accidents this summer, the first fatalities in that organization’s 25-year history.
Patients must apply for the program, demonstrating that they have a compelling need for the service and that getting to their appointments would be a financial hardship. But there are no set financial requirements.
"(Potential patients) say, ‘Well, what’s the catch?’ ” Thomas said. “I’ll say, ‘There is no catch.’ They say, ‘How many times can I do this?’ ‘As many times as you need to.’ ”
Johnny Woodard of Monroe, who has pancreatic cancer, said he has been on four Pilots for Patients flights to Houston since February. He plans to fly there again at the beginning of October to determine if he will have surgery.
Woodard said the cancer center he visits in Houston is highly regarded and it would be hard to get there without the volunteer pilots.
“It just makes it so much easier for a sick man to travel an hour and a half to get to Houston rather than travel six hours in a car,” Woodard said.
Since the patients often have illnesses that require repeat treatments, such as cancer, Lehmann said he has become friends with many of the people he has flown to appointments.
“There’s something very special, especially when you’re alone with a patient who’s got a life-threatening illness and you’re flying on a beautiful day maybe 5,000 to 10,000 feet above the surface of the world,” Lehmann said. “Everything looks so nice and orderly, like it all has a purpose. It’s all so beautiful. It really is conducive to conversations that are quite meaningful.”
He remembered flying several times with a Baptist preacher who had been fighting kidney cancer for 14 years. Their last flight was just a few days before the preacher died, Lehmann said.
“We talked about fighting for life and how important it is,” Lehmann said. “How important every day is. We talked about each other’s children. We talked about God.”
Lehmann described volunteering as “gratifying.”
“There are just so many people that give up hope, and we really can provide that hope,” Lehmann said. “They figure, ‘Well, I got this bad diagnosis. I really have no way to go, I’m just going to stay here.’
“You don’t have to give up that easy. We can help you at least get a second opinion.”