A donor kidney saved my lifeToni Somes | 23rd February 2009
IT'S 11 good years since Robert Eastwell received a kidney in an organ transplant operation.
A year past the 10-year time-frame once envisaged as the “average working life” for a donor organ, a quarter of the way towards the unofficial 40-year record of Australia's longest functioning transplanted kidney.
“I was just thinking about it (kidney failure) the other day; I try not to worry about it happening again,” Mr Eastwell said.
“But, yeah, from time to time it crosses my mind.”
On a lighter note he adds: “I mean I wanted a kidney that came with a warranty but they just wouldn't give me one.”
The Warwick local was just 21 when he first experienced kidney problems.
The diagnosis of IgA nephropathy or acute autoimmune kidney disease came as a shock.
“I was unwell and feeling tired so the doctor did some blood tests and the diagnosis came back,” Mr Eastwell said.
“There was no family history, nothing that made me think kidney disease.”
Four years later he experienced renal failure: a sobering deterioration requiring three trips to Toowoomba each week for dialysis.
It was a situation he endured for five years: every Monday, Wednesday and Friday he spent half a day hooked to a machine in a renal ward.
He credits his family, especially his wife, with helping him through the arduous wait for a suitable donor, and the repetitiveness of dialysis.
“Some days I didn't feel like driving to Toowoomba for treatment. It was like going to work some days are harder than others; but I just endured it, the other option wasn't that appealing,” Mr Eastwell said.
When the offer of a donor kidney finally came - via a phone call from a Brisbane hospital, urging him to get there as fast a possible - his immediate response was one of mixed emotions.
“I wanted the kidney because I wanted to be healthy but, on the other hand, I was worried about my body rejecting it,” he confessed.
“A lot goes through your mind.
“My family had already offered to be donors for me but I knew I didn't want to put them in that position.”
So with trepidation he accepted the donor kidney and, after major surgery and a significant recovery time, he returned home: healthy.
“Getting a transplant is not actually a cure, it's a holiday off dialysis,” Mr Eastwell said.
He has spent the past decade on a cocktail of anti-rejection drugs and with a mixture of relief and gratitude in his heart.
The generosity of an unknown family has given him the chance to become a husband and a father.
“I am enormously grateful; I don't know what else to say.
“It has allowed me to return to life as normal.”
Although the long-term impact of his medication may prevent him from personally become an organ donor, he is a vocal advocate of the concept.
“People are generally reluctant to become donors but it's important they talk about it with family and put it in their wills,” Mr Eastwell said.
“I think the reluctance comes about because people are worried their loved ones will get butchered as part of process but that isn't the case.
“Medical professions handle it in a very dignified way and the process of removing organs is very similar to the process of transplanting them.”
He urged Warwick people to use Organ Donor Awareness Week, which runs from February 21 to 28, to discuss their feelings with their family.
“It's an uncomfortable topic but a conversation that many of us need to have,” Mr Eastwell said.
LIFE SAVERS
• Organ Donor Awareness Week runs from February 21-28
• Fewer than 20% of Queenslanders are registered organ donors.
• In fact we have a 10 times greater chance of needing an organ or tissue transplant than becoming a donor.
• 30,000 Australians have received life saving transplants since 1965.
• But 1700 people, including 50 children, are currently on transplant waiting lists.
• To become a donor contact Australian Organ Donor Register 1800 777203.
http://www.warwickdailynews.com.au/story/2009/02/23/ldquoa-donor-kidney-saved-my-liferdquo/
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