‘Dr. Josh’ hopes you’ll help him find a new kidney

Dr. Joshua Siegel, a chiropractor who has helped thousands of patients at his Long Beach and Bellmore offices, now needs help himself: He needs a new kidney.

Siegel, 46, became a chiropractor in 2004, fulfilling a lifelong dream that began after his father, Joel, died at 38. Joshua said that his father gained a few extra years of life through chiropractic treatments.

Although he achieved his goal, and opened two Cafe of Life chiropractic offices — including one in Long Beach, where he, his wife and son now live — Siegel’s life has been marked by tragedy.

A decade ago, a man he describes as his “spiritual mentor,” Pasqua Cerasoli, died. Cerasoli, a fellow chiropractor, took Siegel under his wing after the two met years ago at a professional convention in New Jersey.

On March 1, 2021, Siegel’s wife, Holly November, lost a baby girl she had been carrying for 31½ weeks. “It crushed us,” Siegel said last week.

Then, this past February, he said, he felt poorly and went for medical tests. He was told by a doctor that he needed to be admitted to a hospital immediately. Then he was informed that he was in renal failure. He said last week that he believed the loss of his child contributed to the decline in his health.

“The doctors didn’t know how I was walking around,” he said.

His kidney function is now down to about 20 percent, which affects him physically and emotionally. He is on dialysis, a procedure that removes waste and excess fluid when a kidney isn’t working properly. The procedure, Siegel said, makes him feel “as if I had run a marathon.” He had to cut back on work at his two offices, and is going through his savings.

This week, he and his wife planned to start an online crowdfunding page.

Two weeks ago, Siegel said, he began a lengthy and exhaustive evaluation process at New York-Presbyterian Columbia University Medical Center. He will soon be on a waiting list for a kidney donor, but that list is years long. He is hoping for a living donor, because kidneys from living people last longer than organs from those who have died.

According to the National Kidney Foundation, about 100,000 people in the United States are awaiting kidney transplants, and in 2021, nearly 6,000 people received living kidney donations.

Siegel said he is accustomed to loss in his life. His father died a week after his bar mitzvah. “He was the best dad,” Siegel said. More than 20 years ago, his sister, Melissa Joy, a 20-year-old college student, was killed in a Florida auto accident. She was one of five young people in the car. The others all survived.

Siegel established the Melissa’s Rainbow of Joy Foundation in her honor. It advances drunk-driving awareness through such organizations as Mothers Against Drunk Driving and Students Against Drunk Driving.

His wife, Holly, a special-education teacher in the Rockville Centre school district, said that she and the couple’s son, Shane, 6, have always lived with faith. “God has a plan,” she said. “I always want to keep everything as joyful and pleasant as possible for our family.” Shane “knows we’re going through a tough time.”

Siegel has proved popular among his patients, and one of them, Sharon Curley, 58, now works for him part-time. A few years ago, she was having stomach problems, she said, and was told by her doctor to take antacids. She didn’t want to use them, and instead visited “Dr Josh,” as he is often called.

Curley said that Siegel adjusted her spine, and the stomach problem, and migraine headaches, went away.

“He has been through so much,” Curley said. “And he’s a man who loves his community. He wants to make everybody better. He treats everybody like his family. He lives his profession.”

Anyone wishing to learn about the screening process to donate a kidney can go to ColumbiaSurgery.org/kidney-transplant.