A writer I knew went away on vacation with her family, and I was stunned to hear, a week later, that while they were away, her husband was suddenly stricken with kidney failure. Happily, he was able to find a donor very quickly; he had a kidney transplant and has been fine ever since.
Kidney transplantation was one of the great medical success stories of the 20th century, partly because we’re born with a spare. We only need one kidney, but we arrive with two, and if we don’t need that extra one, we can now give it away and restore someone to health.
Chances are, you know someone who has been given a reprieve in this way. Our local eye specialist, Jon Milford, is now the longest-living kidney transplant recipient in Georgia. A young woman named Tashia, whom many of us met when she worked in a local restaurant, learned that she had terminal kidney disease, went looking for a donor, and discovered that her best friend from childhood was a perfect match. We worried while Tashia searched for a donor, celebrated when her friend came forward, and watched with amazement as Tashia’s health and vitality came rushing back after the transplant.
Now another of our local folks is looking for a donor. At 52, Kathy is a lively, lovely woman with bright eyes and a ready laugh. It’s hard to believe that she’s been dealing with hereditary kidney disease for five years. Last July she was placed on the transplant list, and she’s been doing a delicate balancing act ever since, trying to postpone dialysis for as long as possible and still stay healthy enough to qualify for transplant surgery.
Kathy could have expected that her congenital disease, if it came, would wait until she was in her 70s, but a back injury in her late teens damaged both kidneys and started the ball rolling early.
A donor who turns out to be a match for her would enable Kathy to have a transplant right away and get on with her life as a wife, mother and grandmother. There are about 20,000 kidney transplants performed each year in the U.S. (out of the more than 75,000 people waiting and hoping for transplants), and more than a third of the transplanted kidneys now come from living donors. (The rest are from people who have passed away, and have stipulated that they wish to donate their organs when they die.) Typically, living-donor kidney transplants are entirely without complications, and a living donor gives the recipient a slightly better shot at an excellent recovery (98 percent as compared with 95 percent) — not to mention cutting the waiting time to zero.
If you would like the experience of offering someone a new lease on life, please contact me at the library or at 706-335-9461. I’ll put you in touch with Kathy, and you can have a blood test to see if you might be a match for her. Giving the gift of life and health is a way to make a difference, big-time!
Susan Harper is the director of the Commerce Public Library. She lives in Commerce.
