Kidney donor faced many Pittfalls

The Timaru Herald | Saturday, 05 July 2008

Kidney donor faced many Pittfalls

Donating a kidney to her cousin Johnny Kamo might have been an easy decision for Eva Gregory-Hunt to make, but the logistics of doing so were far less straight forward. Staff reporter Rhonda Markby talks to the pair who will be away from their island homes for months to enable Johnny to have a better life.

When Eva Gregory-Hunt goes home to Pitt Island she will have a 20cm scar as a souvenir of her time on the mainland. When her cousin Johnny Kamo goes home he, too, will have a scar and a new kidney.

For the 39-year-old mother of six and St John ambulance volunteer, her visits to the mainland are often to Timaru for St John training.

But not this time. The medical aspect of her visit has been far more personal, donating a kidney to her cousin.

For live donors there will be always the inconvenience of surgery and recuperation, but for Eva there has been so much more.

Her decision four years ago to offer her cousin, a Chatham Islands farmer, a kidney, has meant major upheaval for Eva's family a five-month change of address from Pitt Island to Oamaru.

For the last two months, 24-hour-a-day electricity, takeaways and the ability to play sport with a full team have been among the luxuries Eva and her three youngest children have enjoyed. It has also meant farmer-husband Marty has been able to spend time in his part-time job, working for Timaru livestock broker Peter Walsh.

But go back four years. Why would a 35-year-old mother of six children then aged three to 13, be willing to give up a kidney?

"I love him," she said of her cousin. Without a kidney transplant she knew Johnny, who was only 38, faced at the very least time on dialysis, an option not available on the Chatham Islands.

Yes, she has six children. Yes, at some stage in the future one of them might need a kidney, but there is no guarantee she would even be compatible. And Johnny needed a kidney now.

"And we need him as a shearer, he's been bloody awful the last few years," Eva quipped, making light of her donation.

She discussed her plan with Marty, and was realistic enough to check her life insurance policy would be valid if she should die during the procedure.

Eva and Johnny also told their elders of the plan. Everyone agreed.

When his condition deteriorated last year, Eva flew to Christchurch and underwent the initial tests to see if she might be a suitable donor. She already knew they had the same blood type.

Those tests came back positive. Then there were the scans and health checks to ensure Eva was healthy enough to give up a kidney.

Then she had to convince a counsellor she was making the donation for the right reasons.

Eva had no difficulty rationalising why she should donate her kidney. She is already a blood donor and if she was unwell she would happily receive a blood transfusion or an organ transplant.

Simply put, if it's good enough to accept an organ, it's good enough to donate one. Equally, she accepts others have the right to different views.

With Johnny's condition deteriorating and him in constant pain, a May transplant date was decided on. It fitted best with the farming calendar and meant Eva would be healthy in time for a special function later this year.

While the actual transplant meant a week-long hospital stay, the logistics of life on Pitt Island made it impractical for her to return home after the operation and then fly back to New Zealand for her six week check-up.

For Eva there was a bit more to it than packing a toothbrush for her hospital visit. While one of her elder children would become her caregiver, there were the three youngest, Ethan, 7, Yvonne, 8, and 10-year-old Hamish, to uproot from their school of eight pupils (including themselves) on Pitt Island.

Oamaru was chosen for their mainland base as two of the older children were already boarders at St Kevins College.

For Ethan and Yvonne, Oamaru has been their first experience of New Zealand.

A great believer in the philosophy of "things will work out", Eva explains how the family found a fully furnished home to rent in Oamaru only weeks before the operation.

Financially the Canterbury Health Board does help out. It paid the air fares for Eva and a caregiver as well as a daily accommodation allowance needed for the family to rent the Oamaru house. She believes she is entitled to a sickness benefit but is yet to receive it.

A week after arriving, Eva and Johnny booked in to Christchurch hospital for the operation the following day.

All went well. The transplanted kidney began functioning immediately.

As soon as she came around, Eva asked how Johnny was. Staff told her he did the same about her.

It was the next day before she could see him. Eva still smiles as she recalls how different he looked in such a short time. The yellowness had gone from his eyes.

Eva plays down the aftermath of her surgery, mentioning stomach pains, but adding panadol was sufficient for pain relief.

While her recovery was trouble-free, she says her decision not to return to Pitt Island immediately was the right one. Life would simply have been too hard chopping the wood for the coal range, isn't recommended post surgery exercise.

Her six-week checkup showed she had come through the operation without a problem.

Eva is now working on her fitness, adding sessions in the pool to walking as she attempts to regain her fitness.

While she was due to go back to her job as part-time teacher and caretaker at the Pitt Island school later this month, Eva and Marty have decided to extend the family's mainland experience. While the children have had enough of life in the "big city" and yearn for being back home where they can go pig hunting and roam the island, there is another reason Eva is staying on the mainland a little longer.

She wasn't in a hurray to volunteer the information, but others mention Eva has a special St John ceremony to attend. She is being made a serving sister, recognising her 15 years of service to the organisation.

With that ceremony over, Eva will be heading back to her rural lifestyle, to everything from helping with the annual cattle muster to assisting St John and making the six kilometre trek on the quad bike to take the children to school.

Apart from being unable to take some medication, she's confident the loss of one kidney will make little difference to her life.

What will be a much greater reminder of her single kidney status, will be every time she sees Johnny farming, training his race horses getting on with life.

http://www.stuff.co.nz/timaruherald/4608132a6572.html