Let me tell you about my mum and my best friend, Angela. She is the most compassionate person I know. She has always gone above and beyond to help others in need – and not just people. Those of you who know her will be familiar with her passion for animal welfare and her lifelong mission to rescue cats (and occasionally dogs!) in need. Now she is the one in need and it’s our turn to rescue her.
Angela has severe kidney failure. It was first diagnosed when she was a little girl, having her tonsils out. She was warned never to have children as that could prove life-threatening. Despite this, she bravely decided to fullfil her lifelong wish to be a mother and gave birth to me in 1980. I am my mum’s only child – it has only ever been just us, and we are extremely close. That’s why I’m determined to do everything I can to keep her here with me for as long as possible.
Recently, Angela’s condition has deteriorated due to her kidney failure. She suffers every day from constant tiredness, breathlessness, minimal energy and chronic bone pain.
The doctors say she will soon need to go on dialysis three times a week, for several hours at a time. But while dialysis will keep her alive, it has its own risks. It will also only provide 10 to 13% of normal kidney function.
The best outcome
A much better alternative would be a kidney transplant and Angela has been on the transplant waiting list for some time now. But there are over 5,000 people waiting for a kidney in the UK and the average wait is three years. This is why Angela’s doctors have told us that her best option is to search for a living kidney donor. This is because living kidney transplantation gives the transplanted kidney a better chance of long-term survival compared with deceased donor transplants. Pre-emptive transplants (performed before the need for dialysis) have the best outcomes.
I was tested to be a donor last year and, although I was a perfect match, I was found to also have similar kidney problems. While these are thought to be not serious enough to cause me problems in the future, the doctors would not let me donate one of my kidneys to my mum. This was a massive setback, as you can imagine. Even more so as there are no other close living relatives that could be considered.
In the hope of finding another potential donor I am sharing this page as widely as possible to raise awareness of Angela’s need for a living kidney donor. The generosity of just one person could end her daily struggle of living with advanced kidney failure.
How can you help?
1. Become a living donor
Choosing to become a living donor is a courageous thing do, but many people won’t even consider it because they find the prospect of donating a kidney too frightening. So here are some facts that may take away some of the fear:
Although we are born with two kidneys, you only need one to live a healthy normal life. Donating a kidney does not compromise your health or reduce life expectancy. When one kidney is removed, the remaining kidney increases its work to compensate and provide the function of two.
Donation operations are very low risk; most are done using keyhole surgery. The incisions are tiny and the recuperation period is just a few weeks.
Living kidney donors benefit from life-long supervision under the care of hospital consultants. In the extremely unlikely event that later in life a donor needs an additional kidney, they will take precedence on the transplant list.
Living donor expenses are fully reimbursed by NHS England.
Kidney transplants from living donors are considered a standard procedure. Last year 3,347 kidney transplants were performed in the UK and around a third of those were from living donors.
There are relatively few restrictions on being a kidney donor:
There is no maximum age limit for living kidney donors
Kidney donors can be of a different ethnicity to the recipient
You don’t need to be the same blood group or tissue type as the recipient to donate a kidney. It is possible for “non-matches” to be paired with another donor and recipient in the same situation. The recipients simply swap donors so that each recipient receives a transplant they would not otherwise have had.
If you are interested in finding out more about becoming a living kidney donor, please get in touch by sending me a private message.
2. Share this page!
If choosing to be a donor is not for you, you can still support Angela’s Kidney Quest by sharing this page as widely as possible. It may just reach someone who could be a donor.
If you would like to help with the campaign in any other way (for example, awareness-raising events, fundraising events for kidney disease research or communications), please get in touch with me. I would really appreciate your help.
