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"I've worried about Regina, because I feel like
if anything happens to this girl after she gets my kidney,
if my kidney does anything to her, it would kill me,"
Benson said before the transplant.
However, further series of presurgical tests reassured
Benson that she probably had nothing to worry about.
She had an intravenous pyelogram, or IVP, to make sure
her kidneys were normal, and a renal arteriogram to
make sure the arteries in her kidneys were open. Health
workers also gave her a complete physical that involved
the heart, lungs and back, asked if she had ever experienced
lower back pain, tested her for hepatitis and AIDS,
and took urine cultures to make sure she had no infection.
They even made her take a pregnancy test-just to make
sure.
"They drew so much blood, I didn't think I had
any more left," Benson said jokingly.
However, she added, the testing process was "easier
than I thought it would be." The only difficulty
she had, Benson said, was that some of the tests required
that she not eat beforehand, and she likes to snack
throughout the day.
As health care professionals, Allen said she and Benson
could probably imagine more things going wrong before
and after the transplant than most people. Like any
other surgery, kidney transplants involve risks.
Risks for donors include the normal risks involved
with any kind of surgery, such as bleeding and infection,
as well as urinary leak and renal thrombosis.
Benson said that if her remaining kidney were ever
damaged, she'd be in trouble. However, she said, she
knows from her line of work that significant damage
usually does not occur to the renal area even during
a severe accident.
Benson also said she could develop kidney cancer; however,
this is rare.
Allen's risks included incessant bleeding and her blood
not clotting. Her body also could reject the transplanted
kidney. However, Turton-Weeks said, the newer immunosuppressive
medications make it far less likely. If the kidney comes
from a living donor, there's a 90 percent to 95 percent
chance that the transplanted kidney still will function
within the first year. If the kidney comes from a cadaver,
the chances of rejection are higher.
Odds were even further in favor of a successful transplant
because Benson always has been in perfect health, and
her family has a perfect health history.
Being able to receive a kidney from a nonrelated individual
is a fairly recent phenomenon. About 15 years ago, doctors
considered only immediate family members as donors.
If the kidney patient's family members didn't match,
or the family members didn't want to donate their kidneys,
doctors would look at more distantly related family
members, Turton-Weeks said.
But because modern immunosuppressive medications are
more effective, doctors now can consider spouses and
friends.
This is fortunate for Allen, whose older daughter,
LaShay, 21, was not a blood match, and whose younger
daughter, Raquidia, now 19, was 18-younger than the
recommended age for donating-at the time of Allen's
diagnosis. Half of Allen's immediate family members
also were ruled out because of high blood pressure.
Statistically speaking, patients live longer with transplanted
organs than they do on dialysis, Turton-Weeks said.
The half-life of a living donor kidney is about 15 to
20 years, while the half-life of a kidney from a cadaver
is 10 to 12 years, Turton-Weeks said. "Half-life"
refers to the time until half the patients' transplanted
kidneys stop working.
Allen's doctor told her she might outlive her donated
kidney because she's so young. If this happens, Allen
would go back on dialysis and be included on a new donor
list.
The kidneys don't always last longer, Turton-Weeks
said, because the patients still have the condition
that caused their kidney problems in the first place.
Most dialysis and transplant patients die of something
other than kidney failure, Turton-Weeks said.
High blood pressure caused Allen's renal failure and
is one of the most common causes of kidney failure in
the United States. Hypertension can damage the small
blood vessels in the kidneys, so that the vessels no
longer can clean poisons from the blood.
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