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Transplant Caregiver Advice: Got Tips to Share?

Transplants | Last Active: Jan 25, 2022 | Replies (32)

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@gingerw

@nkdonahue You're absolutely correct. And each transplant center seems to have its own criteria. You mentioned you and your husband being evaluated as living donors. I am presuming this was for your daughter. Was she able to have a peremptive transplant as planned? I am curious!
Ginger

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Replies to "@nkdonahue You're absolutely correct. And each transplant center seems to have its own criteria. You mentioned..."

Hello Ginger,

Yes, we were fortunate that my husband was a good match and qualified to donate. Their surgery took place on November 5th, before she required dialysis. Both my husband and our daughter have recovered very well. It's been about 12 weeks now. Neither one is back to full strength yet, but we understand that it can take quite a while. For a twenty four year old girl that only learned in February that she had any issues with her kidneys, it has been a very challenging. Her creatinine level climbed and her GFR dropped so quickly, we knew that if she didn't get a transplant before the end of the year, she would require dialysis.

We know that we were very lucky that she didn't have to wait longer. In October, as the HLA testing was happening, we learned that she had something called an "artefact" which could make it very slow to find a match through Paired Donation. It's just amazing that in such a short period of time, my husband was able to be fully evaluated and then to donate directly.

It's kind of you to check in.
Best regards!
nkdonahue