The Importance of Living Donors

The video embedded below tells the story of a man who life was saved through the process of living organ donation. His story is powerful and shares some interesting facts about living donation that some may not know. We encourage you to watch this powerful video below.

You can also see the video and read the full news story on www.wkyc.com which is titled "Living Donors Help Ease the Transplant Waiting List" by clicking here.

Congratulations

Today, all of us at the Tennessee Organ Donation Foundation offer our congratulations to all the great people at the Mayo Clinic in Arizona. Recently, doctors, nurses, and others there reached a remarkable milestone - their 2000th kidney transplant !! The truly remarkable thing about this milestone is that approximately half of these transplants were accomplished with living kidney donors.

Mayo Clinic (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The Mayo Clinic in Arizona began performing kidney transplants in 1999. With their 2000th, they become one of the top 10 largest kidney transplant programs in the country. The Clinic is also one of the leading centers for performing paired kidney exchanges, which help increase the pool of kidneys available for transplant.

Besides Arizona, the Mayo Clinic also has campuses in Florida and Minnesota where kidney transplants are performed, also. When you combine the number of kidney transplants performed at all the Mayo Clinic locations in these three states, the Mayo Clinic becomes the #1 kidney transplant center in the U.S. doing more kidney transplant than anyone. We congratulate them for that, too, and on behalf of the 2000 kidney recipients who have received the gift of life at one of their campus locations, we say, "Thank You."

Read entire article : www.YumaNewsNow.com article titled "Mayo Clinic In Arizona Completes 2000th Kidney Transplant"

Son Saves Mother

Bile duct and pancreas 1. Bile ducts: :2. Intrahepatic bile ducts :3. Left and right hepatic ducts :4. Common hepatic duct :5. Cystic duct :6. Common bile duct :7. Ampulla of Vater :8. Major duodenal papilla 9. Gallbladder 10-11. Right and left lobes of liver 12. Spleen 13. Esophagus 14. Stomach 15. Duodenum 16. Jejunum 17. Pancreas: :18. Accessory pancreatic duct :19. Pancreatic duct 20-21: Right and left kidneys Español: Vías biliares y pancreas Català: Vies biliars i pàncrees (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Shay Segura received some bad news in 1999 after donating blood. She learned that she had primary biliary cirrhosis, or PBC. The disease destroys the bile ducts of the liver. The disease is slow in developing but normally leads to a person's liver shutting down. Shay's only hope was a liver transplant, and she received one from her own son.

Shay first started the process of getting on the national transplant waiting list. However, her doctor told her that the wait would likely be too long, and she would die. It was recommended that she consider, and try to find, a suitable living donor. Her son, Bryan Cesario, stepped up to the plate to help his mom. He said, "I wanted to do it when I was 16 but you have to be 18." Shay didn't want him to do it, but he insisted. Both are now doing well and want people to know that living donation is an option for people needing liver transplants. In a living donor liver transplant, either the right or left lobe of the donor's liver is removed from the donor and then transplanted into the recipient. Then, the liver will regenerate itself within the donor in about two months.

For more information about organ and tissue donation and how you can register as a donor in the state where you live, please visit the Tennessee Organ Donation Foundation's website by clicking here.

Read more : publeochieftain.co.newsmemory.com article titled "I'm Giving You My Liver and That's It"

Seeing Things Differently

Even though TODF is a bit "green," we are comprised of people who have been involved with the advocacy of organ and tissue donation for a number of years, such as transplant recipients, donor family members, and living donors. People personally touched by the life-changing miracle of organ and tissue donation. One of our objectives is sharing that tissue donation is just as important as organ donation, because it positively impacts lives, too. We shared one such example in a blog post last week. We share another one today with Robert Gusinsky's story.

Human eye about 1 week after a Cornea transplant. The multiple light reflections indicate folds in the cornea, which later resolved. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

At 14 years of age, Robert was diagnosed with a condition known as keratoconu. It causes a degeneration of the cornea to the point it's shape changes into a cone. He maintained his vision for a long time through the wearing of glasses and contacts and was able to fly planes for a number of years. Eventually, though, his eyesight worsened to the point that he had to give up flying. So, he went to law school, got his degree and law license, and became an assistant United States attorney.

By 2002, the eye disease had worsened to the point where he could only wear his contacts a couple of hours at a time. Without them, he was nearly blind in his left eye. He had to stop riding his motorcycle and had difficulty driving. After his corneal transplant surgery in 2003, things improved dramatically. He got his quality of life back and now has 20/30 vision. He thinks about his donor every day, and sometimes wonders if he sometimes sees things differently through the eyes of his donor. Realizing that a high price was paid to restore his sight, Robert wants people, and donor families in particular, to know that, "... good can come from a really tragic situation."

The reason we share Robert's story is because sometimes people are unable to donate their organs when they pass away. In fact, statistics show that only about 2-3% of us are able to be organ donors. Various factors, such as a person's health condition and cause of death, can prevent one from being an organ donor. However, the important thing to know is that nearly everyone can be a tissue donor, and one tissue donor can improve as many as 50 lives !

For more information about organ and tissue donation, or to learn how to register as an organ and tissue donor, please visit our website, www.SaveLivesTN.org, by clicking here.

Read more - RapidCityJournal.com article titled "Man's Vision Restored Through Donated Cornea"

Tennessee Organ Donation Foundation, Inc. Now Open

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

TENNESSEE ORGAN DONATION FOUNDATION, INC.

AIMS TO EDUCATE

New nonprofit hopes to increase number of registered donors in Tennessee

NASHVILLE, Tenn. – Mt. Juliet resident Johnny Black has formed the Tennessee Organ Donation Foundation, Inc., a new nonprofit organization, whose mission is to educate Tennesseans about the importance of organ and tissue donation and to increase the number of registered donors.

“We want people to know that organ and tissue donation is not about death, but rather about life,” said Black, a heart recipient and Executive Director of the Tennessee Organ Donation Foundation, Inc. “Five years ago, I could have been a statistic – one of the 19 Americans who die each day waiting on a life-saving organ transplant. However, my life was saved because a man I had never met, named Kent, cared enough to register as an organ and tissue donor.”

Black, who lives in Mount Juliet, founded the organization in Nov. 2011 because he perceived a great need to improve public education and awareness about organ and tissue donation in his home state of Tennessee. The Foundation’s Board of Directors is comprised solely of members of the transplant community, including an organ recipient (Black), a donor family member, Doris Gray, and a living donor, George Blank. The Board’s unique makeup ensures that the organization will always have the best interests of people in need of transplants as its number one priority. Each Board member is personally invested in the cause of organ and tissue donation because of his/her own experience with its life-saving and life-improving qualities.

The organization plans to hold various events in Davidson and surrounding counties and will distribute informational literature, answer questions about organ and tissue donation, and convince more Tennesseans to register as organ and tissue donors. In addition, the Foundation plans to hold speaking engagements in the area in order to share the personal stories of organ and tissue recipients and donors and their family members.

For more information about the Tennessee Organ Donation Foundation, Inc. and to learn how to register as an organ and tissue donor, please visit www.SaveLivesTN.org.

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