Dayton woman hesitated to ask for kidney donation

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Dayton woman hesitated to ask for kidney donation
By Marie Rossiter

In 2002, after fighting diabetes for more than 30 years, Karen Stokes was told her kidney and pancreas were failing and she needed a transplant.

The Dayton woman received a transplant, but in 2007 the kidney stopped functioning and Stokes knew she would need to find another donor. This time, Stokes and her doctors looked for a living donor.

However, she was reluctant to ask for help.

“To ask someone to give up a portion of themselves, it seems a little selfish,” Stokes said. “I had a hard time even asking anyone in my family to be a donor.”

When John Tatman, 59, met Stokes in 2004, he was her massage therapist. In recent years, he saw Stokes’ condition deteriorate.

“We knew she needed a transplant, but she always changed the subject whenever I brought it up,” Tatman said. “Finally, I sent her an e-mail saying if I can do this, let’s just start the process.”

Stokes relented and they went through the extensive testing to determine if they were a biological match. Unfortunately, they weren’t due to a variety of factors including blood type and immunity incompatibilities.

But through a paired organ donation program at University Hospital in Cincinnati, Stokes is now looking forward to life after her second kidney transplant scheduled for Friday. UC’s program is the only one of its kind in Ohio

Stokes, 53, will be part of a paired donation procedure involving Tatman, as well as father/son pair Paul and Russell Hiler from Lexington, Ky. Both Stokes and Paul Hiler, who never met each other until Tuesday, suffer from type 1 diabetes that has caused kidney failure.

Russell Hiler is a match for Stokes and Tatman is a match for Paul Hiler.

With an average of a three-to-five-year wait for an organ, the University Hospital program works to bring together pairs of donors and recipients.

Russell Hiler, 34, didn’t hesitate to offer a kidney to his father, who is suffering from kidney failure due to type 1 diabetes.

“My father was there for me all the time when I was growing up,” Russell said. “It was my time to give back.”

In August 2008, Hilers signed up for the paired donation list at University Hospital after finding out they weren’t a good match for each other. Paul currently goes through four-hour dialysis treatments three times a week.

Dr. Steve Woodle, chief of transplant surgery at University Hospital, said the procedure should last about three hours. Organ recipients typically go home after about two days and the donors are discharged after about five days.

Woodle said the prognosis for all four patients is good.

Stokes will be monitored more closely since this will be her second transplant, but she is optimistic.

“I just remember what I felt like after the first transplant,” she said. “I wasn’t diabetic anymore and I felt so much better. I want to feel that again.”

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