Doctor becomes donor to save mom

[okarol]

Doctor becomes donor to save mom
By Aaron Derfel, The Gazette
January 27, 2009

When Razia Huda’s kidneys stopped functioning in the fall of 2007 because of a rare autoimmune disorder, her son Naeem Bhojani didn’t think twice about donating one of his own to help save her life.

“I think every son would do that for his mother,” Bhojani said.

But the 31-year-old Montrealer had another reason to donate his kidney: Bhojani is a physician who has actually taken part in operations involving living organ donations.

And he knew that a living organ is much better for the recipient than a kidney from a deceased donor. Living organs tend to last five to 10 years longer than those from someone who has just died.

What’s more, an organ from a blood relative is less likely to be rejected by the immune system of the recipient – in Bhojani’s case, his 60-year-old mother.

“It’s a double-edged sword,” Bhojani said of his medical knowledge about organ transplantation.

“In one way it’s great, I can help my mother. But at the same time, I worried a lot because I know the complications that are possible.”

Still, the risks were considered relatively minimal and Bhojani underwent surgery on Jan. 6 to remove one of his kidneys. The same day, doctors transplanted the kidney in the body of his mother.

Before the surgery, Huda had to go for dialysis three times a week, five hours each time. She was fatigued, and because of her failed kidneys, she couldn’t drink water or eat fruits and vegetables.

Yesterday, Huda lay in bed in Notre Dame Hospital looking radiant. She smiled as she glanced at two bottles of water on her night table.

“I can finally drink water!” she said. “And I love to eat fruits and vegetables.”

She turned to her son and tears appeared in her eyes.

“As long as I live, I know that my son will exist with me right here,” she said, patting the side of her body.

“At first, I didn’t want my son to donate his kidney. He’s so young. But my son is a doctor and he persuaded me that everything would be okay.”

Bhojani, a third-year medical resident in urology, contacted The Gazette because he said he wants to raise awareness about the merits of living organ donations. Most people don’t know that living transplants are better than cadaveric ones, he said, or that the operation performed on the donor is done laparascopically – that is to say, by making small incisions that reduce the chances of infection.

Bhojani said he also wants to draw attention to what he described as Quebec’s “terrible” living transplantation donation rate. For kidneys, it’s 6.5 per million population, compared with 20.5 in British Columbia.

“We have very good rates for cadaveric organ donations, but we’re terrible for live ones,” he said.

Part of the reason for the gap is that Transplant-Québec, a provincial agency, co-ordinates organ transplantation from deceased persons only. The B.C. Transplant Agency, in contrast, has a mandate for living and cadaveric organ donations.

“When we do promotion, we do talk about living donations,” Québec-Transplant spokesperson Brigitte Junius said. But she did confirm that “we don’t have the mandate of co-ordinating living donations.”

Therefore, falls to Notre Dame and the Royal Victoria Hospital to carry out living organ donation operations, among their other responsibilities.

Huda, meanwhile, was released from hospital yesterday. And her son couldn’t be happier.

“If all goes well,” he said, “and my mother’s immune system doesn’t reject the kidney, it can last for as long as 30 years.”

http://www.montrealgazette.com/Health/Doctor+becomes+donor+save/1220369/story.html