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Altruism motivates kidney donor

Saturday, January 8th, 2011

If Mary Patalita ever needs a kidney, she’ll go to top of list

By Ellie Bogue
of The News-Sentinel

It’s one thing to donate money, food or clothing, but how many people would be willing to donate an organ without first knowing the recipient?

For Mary Patalita, it was an easy choice. She recently donated a kidney without knowing who would be on the receiving end.

“I had a high school friend, my same age, who donated one altruistically and it got me thinking, why not?” Patalita, 63, said. She recently donated a kidney at the Lutheran Hospital Kidney Transplant Center.

“Altruistic donors are not all that common, but we do have a few,” Valerie Barto, a registered nurse and Living Donor Coordinator for the center, said.

Lutheran Hospital’s Kidney Transplant Center, which opened in 2007, is the only one in the region. Since then, 86 transplants have been performed at the unit, with 45 of those coming from living donors. They do two to three transplants a month. Nineteen have been performed this year, with 12 of those coming from living donors; no more than three have been altruistic.

Barto says a person can very easily live a normal healthy life with one kidney.

“We often find patients who need a new kidney may have been living with only one kidney all their lives and never knew it until something went wrong with it,” Barto said.

Patalita got a few objections from her family.

“My son wanted to know what would happen if something went wrong with the one kidney I had left,” said Patalita.

That is one of the questions frequently asked by donors, and Patalita was told a donor goes to the top of the waiting list should something go wrong with their one remaining kidney.

“Normally there is a two-to-three year wait for a kidney, but if you are a donor you go to the top of the list,” Barto concurs.

“The donation cost me nothing,” Patalita said.

All of her medical bills were either covered by the recipient’s insurance or the Lutheran Transplant Center through Medicare.

“If a donor gets a bill, they are told to forward it to us and we will take care of it,” Barto said.

This means all the blood work and X-rays a donor goes through before the surgery, to make sure they are healthy, is paid for, as is their surgery, hospital stay, and even the pain medication they receive after the operation. The Transplant Center will also keep in touch with them for the next several years to make sure their body has adjusted to the change.

The kidney donation is done by laparoscopic surgery. Patalita has four 1-inch incisions on her abdomen, with a slightly longer one over her navel.

“I think that’s where they took it out,” Patalita said.

Patalita met the recipient, a 70-year-old man and his wife, two weeks before the surgery. She says they thanked her for her generosity. While she was recovering from surgery, she paid him a quick visit.

“His room was right across the hall from mine,” Patalita said.

“Donors do not have to meet their recipients if they don’t want to; it is totally up to them,” Barto said.

“I feel like I really gave this man his life back,” Patalita said. “He was spending three days a week in dialysis before the surgery.”

Now that she is recovering, she would like to get the word out about how easy it is to give someone the gift of a new life through a kidney transplant.

“I feel completely at peace with my decision to do this. I feel it was something God wanted me to do,” Patalita said.

For more information on how to donate a kidney, contact Barto at 435-6211.

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Kidney donors give gift that keeps on giving

Saturday, January 8th, 2011

Gigantic organ swap helps county patients enjoy healthier holidays
by Jeanette Der Bedrosian | Staff Writer

Jonathan Harris, 22, of Silver Spring went under the knife last month to receive the gift of life: a new kidney. Harris was one of 32, including eight from Montgomery County, to participate in one of the world’s largest-ever kidney exchanges.

Dialysis was like a second job for Kiran Kochhar, a Colesville resident who had lost one kidney and damaged his other due to chemotherapy for leukemia.

Kochhar, who works full time as an engineer, traveled two hours each way to get to Washington Hospital Center, and that’s not including the four hours he spent three days a week on the dialysis machine itself.

Kochhar has type O blood, and finding a match was difficult. His wife was willing to donate her own kidney, but the couple’s kidneys weren’t compatible. Last month, a new trend in kidney transplants gave him hope.

Kochhar was among 16 donor-patient pairs to participate in one of the world’s largest-ever kidney exchanges. Like Kochhar, many kidney disease patients have no matching family donors and face a long wait on the kidney donor list, so a doctor at Georgetown University Hospital got creative with patients who had family members or friends willing to donate on their behalf. The process goes something like this: If a mother and son are not a match for a kidney donation, there may be another pairing that has the same problem, and the two groups could potentially swap donors.

That’s exactly what Dr. Keith Melancon did on a larger scale in November for the 16 donor-patient pairs. Five of the patients and three of the donors were from Montgomery County.

Kochhar’s wife said the swap ended a painful waiting game for her and her kidney-needing husband.

“You just kind of wait and wait, and you’re always ready to hear there is a kidney available,” Medha Kochhar said. “But it didn’t happen. You have to match on everything. You don’t know if it will go through or not, so you keep your fingers crossed and hope for the best.”

But Kiran Kochhar found a match in Patricia Harris, a 58-year-old Silver Spring mother of 22-year-old Jonathan Harris. In exchange for Patricia Harris giving her kidney to Kiran Kochhar, her son was given one from someone else in the swap. Jonathan Harris had been suffering from renal failure since he was 12 years old and already had one failed transplant. His mom said the swap was a double blessing for her.

“I realize how blessed I am, that my health at 58 years old is such that I could do a tremendous, life-giving thing,” she said. “I started out with one mission, and that was to try and improve the quality of life for my son. As a result, I was able to improve the quality of life for someone else as well.”

Patricia Harris had helped her son with his nightly dialysis for years, a routine she learned to cope with and build around his schooling. When she met Kiran Kochhar and his wife, Medha Kochhar, it was an emotional experience.

“That was huge, because I got to meet him and his wife,” Patricia Harris said. “And his wife—we were the caretakers of dialysis patients—we had a bond, you know what I mean? She just said, ‘Thank you for giving my husband a kidney,’ and I knew what that meant. That was just huge. It’s been a tremendous form of giving, and it’s something I just hope a lot of other people consider.”

“I have a new freedom,” said Kiran Kochhar. “I’m liberated. I was tied to a chair, and now I can travel anywhere.”

Kidney swaps are growing in popularity, because many kidney disease patients have antibodies in their bloodstream as a result of race, pregnancy, previous infections or dialysis, according to Melancon, who is director of kidney and pancreas transplant patients at Georgetown University Hospital and Washington Hospital Center. These antibodies make the patient less likely to find a match. With Washington, D.C., having such a racially mixed population, more patients have the antibodies, and, as a result, a tough time finding a kidney donor match, he said.

In this round of swaps, 10 of the 16 patients would be considered a racial minority, according to Marianne Worley, the director of media relations with Georgetown University Hospital.

“We are trying to address the group of people who, number one, have the highest rate of kidney disease, and number two, who have the hardest time getting a kidney transplant,” Melancon said.

Melancon keeps a list of patients in need of a kidney that includes their blood types and the antibodies they have. A computer program goes in and fits the pieces of the puzzle together to create as many matches as possible. A technique called plasmaphoresis helps remove some of the antibodies in preparation for surgery.

Similar swaps were organized by Melancon in January, July and December 2009 as well as in June 2010. Each consecutive swap has grown in size, leading up to this one, which was done at roughly the same time as another unrelated 16-way exchange in Texas.

Such a large undertaking is no easy feat for Melancon or the staff of the hospitals that helped out, but seeing the patients meet their donors makes it worth it, he said.

“This takes an incredible amount of work from the nurses and the coordinators,” he said. “It’s an incredible amount of work above and beyond what they normally have to do, and they get to see the fruits of their labor. When they see the big picture of all this coming together—the raw emotion of it all—the message comes home. It’s really my favorite part of the process.”

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Letter about mother’s need for kidney prompts responses

Saturday, January 8th, 2011

BY KATHIE DICKERSON • Staff Writer • December 26, 2010

COSHOCTON — In this season of sharing, two women have stepped forward and offered Sherie Hunt the gift of life.

Sherie’s son, 6-year-old Jesse Hunt, wrote a letter to Santa asking for a kidney for his mother. Sherie’s kidneys have been damaged by Type 1 diabetes and she’s been undergoing dialysis for the past couple of years.

“It would just break me into a million pieces if my children were in that situation,” said Samantha Moyer, a 26-year-old Nashport mother of two who has offered one of her kidneys to Sherie.

She read about Sherie Hunt in the Dec. 12 edition of the Zanesville Times Recorder. The article also ran in the Coshocton Tribune since Hunt is a Coshocton County resident.

“I can’t really explain what happened,” Moyer said. “I read it and reread it and I cried, and thought, ‘What can I do to help these people?’”

After talking with Sherie’s mother, Kathy Burris, Moyer contacted Ohio State University Medical Center Transplant Center. She’s waiting for the center to call her back and set up an appointment to be tested.

But even if she isn’t a match for Sherie, Moyer said she can hold onto to her kidney until someone who matches her needs it, then that family can get tested to see if anyone is a match for Sherie.

David Crawford, with OSUMC media relations staff, confirmed this.

“It will be like helping her even if I’m not a match,” Moyer said. “It’s like paying it forward. I like to think that if anyone in my family ever needed something like this, someone would step forward.”

Moyer said she was touched by Jesse’s selflessness, asking Santa for something for his mother.

Frazeysburg-area resident Bonnie Peck felt the same way. She also has contacted the transplant center to get set up for testing.

“All that little boy wanted is for his mom to get well,” Peck said.

Peck also doesn’t want Sherie’s mother to go through the same thing she went through.

“I know what it’s like to lose a child,” Peck said. “I don’t want Sherie’s mother to go through that.”

Her son, 19-year-old Kenneth Peck Jr., died suddenly of a heart attack in November 2007.

“(Sherie’s) mother is so sweet and doesn’t want to lose a child,” Peck said. “But she told me if I have any concerns or decide I don’t want to do it, not to feel bad. I told her not to have any concerns; I want to do this, and if I’m a match, I will.”

Peck said Kenneth was the oldest of four children and a big help to her as a single mother.

“He was the father of the house and took care of his brother and two sisters every day while I worked,” she said.

Burris said she is overwhelmed by the women’s generosity.

“I sure do hope that one of them is able to help,” she said. “They both sounded very sincere.”

Sherie is recuperating from surgery performed a couple of weeks ago when doctors had to remove three toes on her right foot, the result of Charcot foot, a progressive degenerative condition that affects the joints in the feet. The condition is caused by several diseases, but primarily by diabetes.

Sherie said she’s afraid to get her hopes up right now, but she is grateful the women have offered to try and help her.

“It was really nice of two people who are strangers to step up and make this offer,” she said.

Jesse was counting the days until Christmas and hoping his mom would get well enough to get up and out of the wheelchair, where’s she been while her foot heals.

“It’s the season of miracles, and I hope to have a Christmas present for Sherie,” Moyer said.

kdickers@coshoctontribune.com; (740) 295-3442

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Hero’ gives kidney to stranger

Saturday, January 8th, 2011

By Sarah Rohrs / Times-Herald
Posted: 01/01/2011 01:01:19 AM PST

Lindy Pickens of Vallejo enters the new year with renewed health, thanks to a man she had never even met until he had intervened.

Without even knowing her name, Jim Claflin of Chico had given Pickens, 57, one of his kidneys, reviving her and saving her from years of dialysis.

“He’ll always be my hero,” Pickens said.

Other than a little pain in her right side, Pickens said, she feels great now — and profoundly grateful to a Chico State University geography professor who simply wanted to give.

Claflin, also 57, decided last year to donate a kidney without knowing who the recipient would be.

“The idea stuck with me (donating an organ) and I kept thinking about it off and on and then just decided to do it,” Claflin said.

“It was a way for me to give, and I’m just more comfortable giving than receiving,” he added.

Claflin’s timing was perfect for Pickens, who has a real estate brokerage on Tennessee Street and is involved in Leadership Vallejo and other community efforts.

Before the Dec. 14 operation at UC Davis Medical Center, Pickens was suffering from renal failure as a result of polycystic kidney disease, an inherited condition that began to trouble her in her late 40s, she said. Chronically tired for several years, she had also begun to retain water.

On a waiting list for a kidney donation for about six months, she had undergone dialysis for four months, a process that artificially performs the organ’s functions.

People can function, even thrive, with just one kidney, a factor which greatly influenced Claflin, a self-described “health freak,” he said. An avid mountain biker who also regularly works out, Claflin eats well, and doesn’t smoke or drink.

“We have two and we can survive with one,” he said.

Claflin decided to donate a kidney after his daughter, a nursing student, told him about a class on organ transplants. He went onto the Internet and eventually found the UC Davis Medical Center transplant center.

Pickens had expected to be on a wait list for a kidney for four or five years and was hoping for a donation from a live donor, which is generally more successful than an organ from someone who has passed away, she said.

Unexpectedly, Claflin popped up and turned out to be a perfect match, she said.

The two didn’t meet or even know each other’s names until Dec. 21 when they both agreed to come to a follow-up medical appointment together. Donors and recipients can choose to remain anonymous, if they prefer, they said.

The meeting was a “very emotional” one for Pickens, she said.

Claflin said the encounter made it all the more real.

“It was incredible and amazing. It was the highlight of this whole experience,” he said.

“I’m just glad Lindy is doing well,” he added.

The pair agreed to publicize their experience as a way to raise awareness of the need for live organ donations.

Between 16,000 and 18,000 people are on waiting lists nationwide for kidney donations, UC Davis living donor program coordinator Sharon Stencel said.

“There’s a huge need,” Stencel added.

Besides Claflin, the center has had just one other altruistic kidney donor in 2010, Stencel said.

Kidney wait lists are the longest, she said, because people can live with dialysis for years, though with a diminished quality of life.

With the advent of a new year, Pickens said she will start lecturing and doing other work to drum up support for the live donor program.

When asked if she’ll keep in touch with Claflin, Pickens said “absolutely,” with a catch in her voice.

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‘My angel has come to visit’

Monday, May 17th, 2010

Story inspires woman to donate kidney to stranger

BY ANNA SUDAR • Advocate Reporter • May 10, 2010

NEWARK — Reese Alban had never met Donna Saalfield.

But that didn’t stop him from embracing her in a grateful hug when she came to his house.

“My angel has come to visit me today,” he said. “I finally get to meet our angel.”

Alban, of Newark, and Saalfield, of Heath, met for the first time April 29 to talk about the upcoming surgery that will change their lives.

Saalfield is donating one of her kidneys to Alban, giving him the chance to live a life without dialysis.

After months of testing, their surgery is scheduled for May 21 at Ohio State University Medical Center.

“I am just so humbled,” Alban said. “We are so thankful.”

Alban has been undergoing dialysis for end-stage renal disease for more than a year.

A native of Newark, Alban, 68, and his wife, Kaye, have spent most of their 46 years of marriage running The Sam Alban Co. on West Main Street. But they had to close the furniture store in 2008 when Alban’s health deteriorated.

Four years ago, he was diagnosed with high blood pressure. Doctors think he suffered from pulmonary hypertension.

His lungs became so weak he needed to use oxygen and inhalers. Medication eventually helped him get his hypertension and breathing under control, but his high blood pressure destroyed his kidneys.

In March 2009, he began dialysis at Choice One Renal Care in Newark, three times each week for four hours.

Although Alban dreamed of traveling with his wife, he had to stay close to Newark so he could go to dialysis. The treatments left him exhausted.

“When I’m on dialysis, it’s life but it’s not really living,” he said. “I come home and don’t really do much.”

Alban’s doctors suggested he consider a kidney transplant, but because of his age, he was only eligible for an organ from a live donor.

His wife and son, Matt, had health problems that made them ineligible to donate.

Friends and relatives offered to help, but none of them had the O positive blood type required to donate to Alban.

In early January, The Advocate published a story about Alban’s search for a compatible donor. Eighteen people contacted the Albans offering to donate.

One of those people was Donna Saalfield. The story caught her eye when she picked up her morning newspaper.

“I recently lost my dad, and that’s what brought me to Reese,” she said. “I thought of his family and how much it would mean to him to be able to spend time with them.”

A mother of three, Saalfield, 43, works as a sales representative for Commercial Electronics in Heath.

“I am a very family-oriented person,” she said. “(In the article) Reese talked about wanting to take his family to Put-in-Bay. That’s not to much to ask for someone who has been working his whole life.”

Saalfield called the Albans, then contacted the OSU Comprehensive Transplant Center to begin the process of donating.

It is possible to live with only one kidney but potential donors must go through rigorous medical testing, said Christine McGowan, a home dialysis nurse and transplant liaison at Choice One Renal Care.

“They have to get lots of testing done, blood work and a family history,” she said. “It’s so the recipient gets a good organ and the donor is not at risk. We don’t want more dialysis patients.”

Potential donors also have to meet with a psychologist, a social worker and a donor advocate, McGowan said.

In mid-April, Alban and Saalfield both got the good news: She is able to donate her kidney.

If all goes as planned, Alban and Saalfield will go into surgery at the same time in operating rooms that are across from each other so Saalfield’s kidney can be transplanted immediately, McGowan said.

Saalfield should be in the hospital only a few days and away from work for two to three weeks, McGowan said.

Although she will have several follow-up appointments to make sure she is healing, she will be able to go about her normal life soon after the surgery, she said.

Alban will spend about six days in the hospital and several weeks recovering. He will have to take anti-rejection medications for the rest of his life, but he won’t need dialysis, McGowan said.

“I hope both of us do well,” Saalfield said. “But I think we are going to be fine. I don’t have any regrets, and I don’t expect any.”

Although her children were nervous when she first told them about the transplant, Saalfield’s entire family is supporting her decision.

Her co-workers are covering her shifts at work so she can have the surgery.

“Before my dad died, he said he would never want to be on dialysis ever; it’s not the kind of life he wanted to live,” she said. “I am hoping this helps Reese a lot.”

Alban doesn’t have any big plans for after the transplant, but said he is excited to be able travel and relax.

“It will be my first true retirement,” he said. “I can kick back and do what I want to do.”

Alban and his wife plan to keep in touch with Saalfield and her family after the surgery is completed.

“We are just so thankful for Donna,” Kaye said. “I’m sure we will be friends. I feel like we already know her.”

McGowan said she sees a lot of her patients get donations from friends and acquaintances, but rarely from someone they’ve never met.

“It’s a little more unusual,” she said. “Living donation is a very wonderful thing, and those who donate are very special.

Although Alban is grateful to be getting a kidney, he knows there are many others who still are waiting for a donation.

Several of the people who couldn’t donate to him expressed interest in giving kidneys to others.

“I hope this encourages other people to donate,” he said.

Saalfield said she never realized how many people are in need of organs until she began the transplant process.

“When we went down to OSU to see the surgeon, my husband and daughter went with me and we were just amazed by all the people waiting for a transplant,” she said. “I hope other people try to do this; you are giving someone more of a life.”

Anna Sudar can be reached at (740) 328-8544 or asudar@newarkadvocate.com.

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Experience: I gave my kidney to a stranger

Monday, May 17th, 2010

Experience: I gave my kidney to a stranger

To all intents and purposes I had a surplus organ – why shouldn’t I give it to someone who really needed it?

* Maggie Harris
* The Guardian, Saturday 15 May 2010

Experience: Maggie Harris

‘There was never any question of ­backing out, but I wondered if this was how young soldiers felt when called into ­battle. Christopher Thomond for the Guardian

I was at a dinner party six years ago when I decided I wanted to give my kidney to a stranger. Someone mentioned a friend who’d had a kidney transplant that had worked for a while, then been rejected. This man was back on dialysis, had become diabetic and lost his eyesight.

The rejected kidney had come from his brother and he was desperate to find another but had no other family members. I could see how awful this situation was – why should people be prepared to donate only to people they knew? At 60, I was a long-term blood donor and had always enjoyed good health. There was no history of kidney disease in my family, and I couldn’t imagine either of my daughters – then in their early 20s – needing a transplant. On average, a healthy kidney from a live donor gives the recipient an extra 15 years’ life expectancy, free from dialysis, and to all intents and purposes I had a surplus organ – why shouldn’t I give it to someone who really needed it?

Except it wasn’t that easy. At that point, I discovered, only family members or close friends could be considered. But there was an expectation the law would soon change and I went to my GP, who referred me to a hospital with a transplant unit. I later received a call from the coordinator nurse, who pretty much told me to forget it.

But I didn’t forget it. One of our neighbors is a professor of medical ethics, who put me in touch with a surgeon who was prepared to take me seriously. I underwent a series of physical and psychological tests. The psychiatrist wanted to get to the bottom of why I wanted to donate to a stranger. What were my expectations? Would I suffer a sense of anticlimax afterward and become depressed? Was I doing it to try to solve some sort of crisis in my own life? I understood the need for this, but had no ulterior motive, beyond the expectation of feeling “good” about helping someone.

She also wanted to know whether I’d told friends, and what my family thought. My husband and children had been quite taken aback, but saw I was determined to go ahead and respected my wishes. On the other hand, I found the attitude of some of my friends shocking and hurtful. One implied it was “wrong”, despite failing to explain why. Another sourly described me as a “secular saint – St Margaret of the One Kidney”. I’d never suggest a healthy person has a moral obligation to give up a kidney, but I can’t help thinking these friends saw my act as a “challenge”, one they couldn’t – or wouldn’t – rise to, and that they felt angry and resentful as a result.

Soon after my tests, the Human Tissue Act finally made altruistic donation possible by 2006. The following year, I learned a matching recipient had been found for my kidney. With a date set for the operation, the reality of what I was doing became less abstract and I started to feel a bit queasy. There was never any question of backing out, but I wondered if this was how young soldiers felt when called into battle. I had a couple of months of increasing unease, of waking in the night thinking, “What if…?”

Actually, the risk was minimal – no one in this country has died as a direct result of having a kidney removed. All the same, it wasn’t easy – I was working as a teacher, and had to take seven weeks off. Both my daughters were born by caesarean section, and I’d expected similar pain and discomfort, but I wasn’t prepared for the severe nausea that often kept me bed-bound.

The operation was a success, but I’ve never had any contact with the recipient and know very little about him. I’m thankful for that – it would be an awkward, artificial relationship, and I don’t want anyone feeling beholden to me. I’m also protected against potential disappointment. What if he turned out to be a member of the BNP, or Mark Thatcher?

Giving your kidney to a complete stranger is still rare – so far, only 25 volunteers have been approved. But more than two years on, I feel every bit as healthy with one kidney as I did with two. I’ve had no sense of anticlimax, nor am I wandering around in a haze of self-satisfaction, but I do feel good about what I’ve done. We live in an unfair world, where health and happiness aren’t evenly distributed, and I’ve had more than my fair share. My act was simply to redress the balance a little.

As told to Chris Broughton

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Kidney donor felt called

Monday, May 17th, 2010

Woman responds to prayer request of ailing parishioner
Friday, May 14, 2010 2:52 AM
By Gail Martineau

Vonden Sparks, left, received a kidney from Terry Meade. Both are members of New Albany United Methodist Church.

Vonden Sparks, left, received a kidney from Terry Meade. Both are members of New Albany United Methodist Church.
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Vonden Sparks and Terry Meade have a spiritual and physical bond that will last the rest of their lives.

Both are members of New Albany United Methodist Church, but they barely knew each other until August — when Meade donated a kidney to Sparks.

Now, they consider each other family.

Before the transplant, Sparks had end-stage renal disease, the result of a long battle with diabetes. He’d been on the waiting list for a kidney transplant for two years.

The only thing keeping him alive – aside from faith and a sense of humor, he said – was frequent dialysis, and that couldn’t continue indefinitely.

The Johnstown resident, now 56, was just about out of options when he appealed to his congregation in a prayer request last year.

“The congregation has so many connections,” said Nancy Goulet, head pastor at New Albany United Methodist. “We didn’t know if any of them individually would be able to help.”

Meade said that as soon as she heard the prayer request, she felt called to help Sparks.

“God decided this whole event,” said Meade, 64. “I would have never done it in any other event.”

Meade, who lives in Westerville, went through about five months of physical and mental examinations at Ohio State University Medical Center to determine whether she would be a suitable donor for Sparks.

“I’ve been tested from the tip of my toes to the top of my head,” she said, laughing.

Sparks was thrilled when he received word that a donor had been identified. He was amazed when he found out who it was.

“She contacted me about two weeks before the surgery and said that we’ve got a surgery date,” he said. “I was totally shocked.”

Goulet, on the other hand, said she wasn’t surprised.

Meade, the pastor said, is “one always wanting to do for others.”

“That’s just her nature,” Goulet said. “It just warms my heart to know that people take their faith so seriously and that they are willing to give a part of themselves – literally.”

Meade said the experience has made her a believer in organ donation.

“I would do it again in a heartbeat if I had double of everything,” she said. “It only really hurt for about 12 hours.”

Helping Sparks, she said, has changed her life.

“The change isn’t physical, it’s more mental and spiritual,” she said. “Knowing I’ve given him the ability to enjoy life a little longer – it’s hard to put it into words. It’s a feeling of true fulfillment.”

Sparks said he hopes others follow Meade’s example. If nothing else, he said, people should arrange to donate their organs upon death.

“I think it’s a shame that people pass away and are buried with organs,” he said. “Why not give the gift of life to someone who needs it? There is no reason for anyone to die for lack of an organ.”

Sparks and Meade, who in the past might have exchanged greetings every other Sunday, now sit through church services with their arms around each other.

“She’s a sister now,” Sparks said. “That’s just the way it goes. You develop a relationship with the person who gives you life. If it wasn’t for them, you’d be dead or having a life of dialysis.

“It makes you feel real good about where you go to church.”

gmartineau@thisweeknews.com

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La Puente man, scared of needles, donates kidney to ailing nephew

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

By James Wagner, Staff Writer
Posted: 04/25/2010 07:02:53 AM PDT

Dominic Valdez, 27, left, who was diagnosed with end stage renal failure, received a kidney from his uncle René Valdez, 41, right, three months ago. The two pose Thursday, April 22, 2010 at their La Puente home. René Valdez received a La Puente hero award for saving his nephew’s life. (SGVN/Staff Photo by Sarah Reingewirtz Reingewirtz)

LA PUENTE – Over the past year, Rene Valdez has been poked, prodded and had his blood drawn dozens of times – something that frankly doesn’t sit well with him.

Valdez is so scared of needles that, until last year, the 41-year old man hadn’t visited a doctor since he was six.

But two years ago, Chavez learned his 25-year-old nephew Dominic Valdez was in desperate need of a kidney transplant.

So Rene decided to part with one of his.

“Look it, I wouldn’t want to go out being a coward,” Rene said. “I’m not a coward. Even if I have to put my life on the line for nephew, I would.”

This January, doctors at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center transplanted Rene’s left kidney into Dominic.

Before he learned his kidney’s were failing, Dominic was working as a college counselor. He was in his second year of learning to dance, staying up late after work dancing salsa, rumba and the cha-cha.

His friends told him he was a natural who learned moves quickly. Dominic even considered making a career of it.

But he had constant headaches, and his feet felt hot, things he chalked up to his youth and late-night dancing.

He later learned that those were early symptoms of kidney failure.

He happened to be visiting his doctor for a fairly routine check when he was told his kidneys had been at 50 percent capacity for five years, he said.

He needed a transplant.

The news scared his mother,

Jessica Valdez. But Rene assured his sister that everything would work out. And then he offered his kidney.

“I knew in my heart that I would be a perfect match,” Rene said.

Meanwhile, Dominic went on dialysis.

For 18 months, he daily rushed home from work during lunch to pump fluids in and out of his body through a tube in his stomach, his mother said. He did the same thing at night.

By November, tests confirmed Rene’s hunch: he was a perfect match.

“I already had my kids and had my life,” Rene said. “I figured if I gave him my kidney, he could have a life and family.”

When he was on dialysis, Dominic did little things to show his uncle gratitude.

He occasionally slipped $10 or $20 in his Rene’s wallet, often in small denominations, in hopes his uncle wouldn’t notice.

“I can’t even explain how grateful I feel and thankful I am,” he said.

In Dominic’s case, its still unknown what caused the kidney failure, family said.

The main causes of chronic kidney failure are diabetes and high blood pressure, said Dr. Huy Han, a Rosemead-based nephrologist.

For acute kidney failure, it could be a number of possibilities, he said.

Most people in need of a transplant go on dialysis and wait between three-to-four years for a new kidney, Huy said.

“He’s lucky and that someone was willing to give him one their kidneys,” Han said.

On Jan. 12, the men went into surgery and came out a hitch.

The recovery, however, hurt. It felt like getting “socked in the stomach 900 times,” Rene said.

Both men are healed now. Dominic is dancing again.

Rene said he tells few people about the ordeal.

“But it does feel good,” he said. “It’s good for the soul.”

And despite all the poking and prodding, Rene is still holding onto that fear of needles.

“Yeah, I’m still scared of them,” he said.

james.wagner@sgvn.com

626-962-8811, ext. 2236

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How to Be a Hero in One Easy Step

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

Cari Shane Parven

Washington D.C. based writer
Posted: April 29, 2010 03:09 PM

Six years ago this month, Lisa Peabody’s fourth child, her toddler, passed away. She was only 15-months-old. 63 days earlier, at the age of 13 months, Caroline was diagnosed with a brain tumor.

Caroline passed out of the Peabody’s lives but then, almost miraculously, into the lives of strangers.

“Every day while I sat there with her, hoping and hoping and hoping,” says Lisa Peabody, of Bethesda, Maryland, recalling her days in the ICU with her rosy-cheeked, blonde and blue-eyed baby, “everyday the bells would ring and the beepers would go off and the nurses and doctors would shoo me out … I learned every day that so many of these children were losing a life because they needed an organ, they needed a kidney, they needed a liver, they needed a heart. And I just couldn’t believe that people weren’t giving. Why weren’t people helping while I was watching these babies die?” Peabody says, incredulous, wiping tears from her eyes.

Even as their own child died, it ultimately wasn’t a hard decision for Lisa and her husband, Chris, as they began to discuss organ donation.

“Can’t we do something good … can’t we help someone?” they asked each other. “We can’t be helped,” Peabody remembers telling her husband, [but] she has a whole body filled with working pieces.”

A tiny little hero, standing no more than two-and-a-half feet tall, Caroline saved many lives. By donating her pulmonary arties, she saved the life of a child in grave need of a transplant. Caroline’s heart values, too, saved the life of yet another child. And, still Caroline gave the gift of sight to two more people by donating her corneas. “And I’m very proud to say we helped some other families out there, very proud,” Peabody concludes on a video she made and uploaded to YouTube as part of a donor organ awareness campaign produced by the Washington Regional Transplant Community (WRTC). Each day in April, Organ Donation Awareness Month (designated in 2003), 30 Days, 30 Stories, features the emotional story of donor families, recipients and even those who lost loved ones because there was no donation.

DeShawn McMillan of Fort Washington, Maryland lost her mother because some one failed to donate a liver. “If you think about how many people there are in the world … [yet] we have so many people that are on a waiting list and I think if you just make a conscious decision of signing up to be an organ donor, we can all give something to each other.”

Facts:

18 people die every day, due to the lack of organs available for transplant.

Every 11 minutes, a new name is added to the national list.

The average wait for a kidney transplant is 5 years.2010-04-29-images.jpeg

“Being an organ donor doesn’t cost money, doesn’t cost time, doesn’t take practice, all the excuses and challenges that we always associate with things,” says Kati Penney of Bethesda, Maryland whose daughter Katrina, now in first grade, received a heart donation at the age of 9 months. “Organ donation [is] really just making a decision.”

While WRTC’s 30 Days, 30 Stories campaign is a DC Metro Area (Maryland, Virginia, DC) project, the power of the world wide web has taken this small but emotional project nationwide, even international, because of the powerful on-line site, YouTube.

Organ donation is a relatively new phenomenon. The first successful transplant was a kidney transplant from a live donor performed in 1954. But according to John Ogden, Senior Public Affairs Associate for WRTC, the first donation by a deceased person was performed in 1962, also a kidney transplant. It would be 10 years before the Uniform Anatomical Gift Act established the donor card which no longer exists, though undoubtedly there are those with that card still in their wallets.

By the late 70s, state-run organ donation programs began cultivating relationships with their individual state motor vehicles departments. Currently, every state in the country but Vermont, has a relationship with their DMV which will automatically ask every registering motorist if s/he will register as an organ donator.

Within the past four years, state donation organizations have begun working together, and the efforts have paid off according to Ogden. There is a now a national on-line registry, www.donatelife.net with links to each individual state-run donor organization in all 50 states.

The new, group-effort is paying off. Currently, 86.3-million people are registered donors in the United States, that’s 37.1-percent of all U.S. residents over the age of 18, a 24.4-percent increase since 2007, with an 8-percent-plus increase between 2008 and 2009 alone. In the past three years, Donate Life America says there have been 82-thousand organ transplants, approximately 120-thousand cornea transplants and millions of tissue transplants.

“Briana is … is the unsung hero who gave Katrina her heart,” says Penney who after the transplant sent bi-yearly photos of her own daughter to Briana’s mother. Finally, “we received a letter from [Briana's] mother who talked to us about how it has taken her a bit of time to heal. But each year as she receives the cards and letters from us and looks through Katrina’s pictures, it makes it a little easier to know that there’s another little girl who is out there and is blessed because of Briana.”

Kat Clifford of Herndon, Virginia lost her daughter Kylie only three months after Kylie’s birth. Her decision to donate her daughter’s organs “took probably three minutes. Kylie was gone we couldn’t get her back but could we give someone else something? Yes,” says Clifford on her WRTC produced, YouTube video.

“In such a time of tragedy and loss looking back [donor families are] able to see the donation as some sort of silver lining,” says Ogden. “Nothing is ever going to bring your loved one back, but to know that there are people out there living and breathing today literally because of your loved one. That is an experience that very few people actually have but organ and tissue donor family members.”

“Every recipient will tell you the call is an incredible moment in their lives that they will never forget, says Kathryn Turner of Bethesda, Maryland who is alive today because of a much needed liver transplant. “It was a moment of terror, joy and deep sadness because I knew that someone had lost someone they dearly loved… This made me a tremendously kinder, gentler patient person and I look for ways to do something to help someone else. I write my donor family several times a year, just to let them know how much I appreciate this gift, how much I care about them, how much I respect and love their loved one and how I try to keep my body healthy to preserve what has been given to me,” says Turner on day 28 of the 30 Days, 30 Stories video.

“I feel as if the gift of life I’ve been given by this young lady, I was given for a reason,” says James Selby of Capitol Heights, Maryland who received a heart and kidney from a 17-year-old victim of a motorcycle accident. He believes he was given the gift of life “so that I could live on and … be productive for the both of us.”

Facts, right and wrong:
• A majority of U.S. adults now wish to be organ or tissue donors: 56% up from 50% a year ago.
• 75% of those surveyed want their donation wishes fulfilled regardless of family desires.
• 52% of people incorrectly believe that doctors may not try as hard to save their lives if they know they are registered organ or tissue donors.
• 19% of people are not sure they would be acceptable donors.
• 48% of people incorrectly believe a black market exists in the U.S. for organs and tissue, up from 44% in 2009.
• 16% of people incorrectly believe a regular funeral is not possible following donation, this percentage is up from 13% in 2004.
• 61% mistakenly believe it is possible for a brain dead person to recover from his or her injuries.

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Therapist donates kidney for child

Tuesday, May 11th, 2010

Gift ends Wall family’s agony

By KEITH BROWN • COASTAL MONMOUTH BUREAU • May 8, 2010

WALL — Watching 5-year-old Kiley Hubbard tooling around her yard on her battery-powered toy ATV, a tuft of black hair poking out from under her pink helmet, you’d be hard-pressed to know the 36-pound waif has looked death square in the eye and sent him packing. Three times.

And walking through her backyard with her lifelong friend and former speech therapist Donna Kuchinski, Kiley betrays little evidence of a life spent more frequently in hospitals than out, of nearly six years of hours-long dialysis treatments occurring three- sometimes four times a week, and of the myriad pokes and prods and tests and medicines that have gone along with her condition.

Kiley Hubbard was born without kidneys. She is just weeks shy of her sixth birthday, and she has survived predictions. But until late March, Kiley’s life was on hold, postponed until a suitable kidney donor could be found. And just when Kiley’s body began to give out from the strain of all that dialysis, one was.

And today, on Mother’s Day, while flower shops boom and restaurants bloat with families marking a day for Mom, the Hubbard family plans to spend the day at home, quietly appreciative of their time together, Kiley’s mom, Tina Hubbard, said.

“That’s what it’s all about, isn’t it?” Tina Hubbard said.

It was a long shot, Tina Hubbard said, that anyone would be a perfect kidney match for her daughter. The phalanx of physicians attending to Kiley put a number to it: 1 to 2 percent of anyone who was able to donate would be a match, she said. In other words, almost no one cleared to donate actually could.

Kiley’s a complicated case, in part because of a failed transplant she had in 2005. Mark Hubbard, Kiley’s father, donated his kidney, but there were complications involving then-unknown abnormalities in Kiley’s anatomy that prevented the transplant, despite 16 hours of trying. Tina Hubbard is not a match for her daughter.

Dialysis was the only option. Two and a half hours, three times a week.

“Dialysis is no way of life,” Hubbard said. “It’s a temporary solution — something you do while you wait for a transplant. It’s not meant to be permanent.”

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