Strollerderby : kidney dialysis

Girl Gets Kidney from Mom AND Dad

JeanneSager — Sun, 26 Apr 2009 14:29:00 GMT

She was the world's youngest-ever recipient of a donor kidney when she was just seventeen months old. Now she's on number three - but she's keeping it all in the family.

Kidney number two came from Mom. Now Keeley Beytell-Heron is slated to receive another kidney - this time from her father.

Beytell-Heron was twelve days old when she went on kidney dialysis, the youngest ever child to be put on the machines. She was born of what was a normal pregnancy, carried to term. But within a few days, she was diagnosed with transposed arteries, a condition in just one in ten thousand kids in which two major arteries leaving the heart are connected to the wrong ventricles or lower chambers of the heart. She had emergency heart surgery at ten days old, but post-op complications damaged her kidneys irreparably, prompting doctors to order dialysis, essentially ordering a machine to stand in as functioning kidneys.

Because donor organs for babies and small children are hard to come by, her first came from a man in his thirties. It was a tough fit that doctors made work until she was twelve. Which is when her mother stepped in with a live kidney donation. Now Beytell-Heron is twenty and needs another, and her dad is stepping in.

Kidney donation from within families is relatively common - the need for a genetic match plays significantly into that fact, but kidneys are one of the few things a live donor can offer up, prompting family members to step in to help one another. Donations from both parents, however, are rare - there have been just twelve in the United Kingdom where this family lives.

Let's face it - there aren't many people who can find a perfect match in both Mom and Dad. Although this family is doing a fantastic job of being there for each other, Keeley's story - three transplants needed overall - just reminds parents why they need to get out there and sign to be an organ donor. Inspired to do so? Here's how.

Image: Telegraph

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Blogging Moms Find a Kidney For Teen on Dialysis

JeanneSager — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 17:02:00 GMT

If you've ever doubted the power of the Internet, just imagine the motivation of helping a kid in need thrown in. This is one of those happy holiday stories to make up for all the bad stuff we ended up writing about here on the 'Derby, but I warn you. Get out the tissues.

"Domestic Diva" mom blogger Lisa posted in early November that she could barely keep posting as she watched her teen daughter, Marielle, suffer through her kidneys shutting down. The family was making a drastic move. They were pulling Marielle out of a Philadelphia hospital and heading to New York's Columbia Presbyterian in hopes that the living kidney donor program there could save her life.

Two weeks to the day later, yesterday, Lisa was back online. Blogging mothers across the country had picked up her story and blogged about it, tweeted it on Twitter and shared it on Facebook. Calls poured into Columbia Presbyterian from every state in the U.S., from Africa, from Saudi Arabia. Marielle now has a donor. A friend her mom met through Ebay called the hospital, went through the process and has come up as a match. The teenager is home, still on dialysis, but home for the holiday as doctors work to bring her body to a state of health that will enable them to proceed with surgery.

Yesterday, the day before Thanksgiving, the family released this announcement to the world:

"Thank you to EVERYONE who sent in donor forms, called, blogged, twittered and help spread the word…BUT WE DO NOT NEED ANY ADDITIONAL DONORS AT THIS TIME. I am amazed by the power of the web and the hearts of those who helped make a difference."

Now wipe your tears and get back to that turkey.

Image: Domestic Diva

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Man Shafts Make-A-Wish Foundation

Amy S.F. Lutz — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 12:33:00 GMT

I've always thought there were few charities more admirable or more well-intentioned than the Make-A-Wish Foundation. I know in my head that, in the long run, groups that fund research to cure cancer or heart disease will probably have a greater impact over the long run, but what charity can compare to the immediate gratification of seeing a dying child treated like a princess at Disney World?

So what scumbag, you might wonder, would defraud the Make-A-Wish foundation, and disappoint a very sick boy? Douglas Reisberg, 53, of Arizona, was arrested last week after failing to build a go-cart for a 16-year-old boy on kidney dialysis. Reisberg had been given $11,000 by the Illinois chapter of Make-A-Wish last March and has neither delivered the go-cart nor returned the money, despite repeated discussions with the Foundation and with the boy. This con went so far at one point as to tell the boy he was flying in with the go-cart, so the boy was disconnected from his dialysis machine and taken to the airport - where no go-cart ever arrived.

Reisberg has admitted that he lost thousands of dollars in a bad business deal, and used the Make-A-Wish money to cover some of that loss. But couldn't he have ripped off an animal shelter or something???

Just kidding! Of course it's never okay to steal from any charity. We all know the only businesses worthy of being cheated are the big insurance companies.