‘DID YOU JUST say you have a spare kidney?’
Grace smiled. She knew her phone call would cause Connie Matera some disbelief but she also knew that would rapidly give way to relief and excitement once she explained the situation to her. ‘Yes. I have a spare kidney and it’s going to be yours,’ she repeated.
‘Did someone die?’
As the renal transplant co-ordinator at one of Sydney’s biggest hospitals Grace knew that for transplant recipients their good fortune was often tinged with guilt that someone had died in order to give them what they needed. But that wasn’t the case this time. ‘No. It’s from a living donor.’
‘How—why?’ Grace could hear Connie struggling to find the right words, to ask the right questions. ‘How do you just get a spare kidney?’
‘You’ve heard of the paired kidney exchange programme?’ Grace asked.
‘Yes. But I thought I needed to have someone, a family member or friend, who was prepared to give up a kidney in exchange for one for me? I thought that was how it worked.’
‘Normally, yes, but you got lucky.’ Grace knew that Connie’s family had offered to donate a kidney to her but, while her sister and mother had the same blood type, their tissue type hadn’t been a match and therefore they hadn’t been suitable donors. Which had left Connie having regular dialysis and waiting on the transplant list for a deceased donor. Until now. ‘One of our patients on the exchange programme was a match with a deceased donor so now they don’t need their living donation. That donor has offered to give their kidney anyway and you are the best match on the transplant list.’
‘A stranger is voluntarily giving me their kidney?’
‘Yes.’
‘Has that ever happened before?’
‘Not to my knowledge.’ Was it fear or scepticism Grace could hear in Connie’s voice? She didn’t want her to refuse this offer. It was too generous and meant too much. ‘This is good news, Connie. It’s your lucky day.’
Grace heard Connie’s deep intake of breath. ‘Yes, yes. Of course it is. What do we do now?’
‘I know you’re scheduled for dialysis tomorrow but can you come in today at two for a pre-op appointment? We need to run some tests and I’m hoping to get your surgery scheduled for next week.’
‘That soon?’
‘Your donor was already scheduled for surgery next Wednesday as part of a paired kidney exchange exercise. The theatres and hospitals are all booked and your donor is happy to go ahead as planned, albeit with a different recipient. If I can get one more theatre here, and if all your pre-op tests are good, we’ll add you to the list.’
‘No more dialysis?’
‘Hopefully this time next week, no more dialysis,’ Grace confirmed. ‘I’ll see you at two.’
‘Okay.’
‘And, Connie,’ Grace added with a smile in her voice, ‘buy a lottery ticket on your way in here.’
She was still smiling as she said goodbye and hung up the phone. She loved this part of her job. As a member of the organ donation team it wasn’t often she got to deliver good news without a side serving of sad news. But in the case of the paired kidney exchange programme, where living donors selflessly offered their organs, it was a rewarding part of the job and Grace was excited.
Some days were tough. Delivering bad news to people was never easy but today was a good day. Today she had a kidney to give away. And today she was going to be busy. The phone call to Connie had been the first piece in the final puzzle. All the other donors and recipients were checked and ready to go. Their surgeries were scheduled for next week but she needed to book one more theatre for Connie and pray that her tests results were what they needed to be. Then she needed to keep her fingers crossed that no one got sick between now and then. Or changed their minds.
She had twelve surgeries to schedule across five different hospitals in three different cities. It was going to be the biggest paired kidney exchange exercise that had ever occurred in Australia and she was part of it. She’d been working in the transplant unit for the past two years but had only recently been promoted to the co-ordinator position. She’d been involved in paired kidney exchange operations before but nothing of this magnitude.
She entered Connie’s details into the nephrologist’s appointment calendar and made sure all the relevant documents, recent test results, new test request forms and consent forms were attached before making a courtesy call to Connie’s GP. Hopefully this time next week six people would each have a new, functioning kidney. She knew how much this meant to the families involved. She’d been one of those families herself.
Now she needed to organise a team meeting. Initially she’d had three of the twelve surgeries scheduled to take place here, at the Kirribilli General Hospital, but now she had a fourth, which meant she needed a fourth surgical team—two for the organ retrievals and two more to complete the organ transplants.
Finally, she made a call to the hospital’s PR division. This would be a big story and some media coverage could be a huge benefit to the drive to encourage organ donation. If they pulled it off.
There was no if, she told herself. They had to do this. There was too much at stake for it not to work. It had to be a success.
* * *
Grace fought to subdue the swarm of butterflies that was taking flight in her belly as she stood out in front of the Kirribilli General and faced a barrage of television cameras and media crews. The countdown had begun.
The transplant surgeries were scheduled to begin tomorrow morning at eight, in just over seventeen hours’ time, but first there was a media statement to be made. She wasn’t alone, she was flanked by numerous members of the renal transplant unit and the hospital’s public relations department. It was a glorious sunny afternoon and the media had turned out in force. Grace didn’t know if it was because it was a slow news day or if they really were interested in the story. She hoped it was the latter. This was a fabulous opportunity for some good publicity and a chance to raise organ donor awareness.
She took a deep breath and tried to calm her nerves as the hospital’s PR spokesperson introduced Professor Elliot Martin, the head of the renal transplant unit. Elliot would introduce the other nephrologists and then it would be Grace’s turn to speak. Public speaking was so not her thing. She didn’t mind talking to the doctors, liaising with other transplant co-ordinators, and even talking to the patients’ families about death and organ donation. That she could handle, but ask her to stand up in front of a group of strangers, well that was a whole different ball game. And strangers with cameras and microphones were even worse. She’d been taking classes and learning a few tricks. She knew her topic so she didn’t need to be nervous but knowing that and convincing her autonomic nervous system of that fact were two different things.
Peering over the shoulder of the person standing in front of her and scanning the crowd, her gaze landed on Lola—her friend, colleague and flatmate. Lola had given her some advice this morning and as she caught her eye, Lola mimed undoing the top button of her uniform and gave her a wink. Grace bit back a smile. Lola’s advice had been to imagine the crowd naked—apparently that was supposed to make them less intimidating.
She flicked her gaze away from Lola before her friend revealed anything she shouldn’t on national television and before Grace herself burst out laughing. She continued to scan the crowd but it consisted mostly of middle-aged men, doctors and hospital administration staff, all approximately twenty years older than her twenty-seven years, and not anyone she wanted to picture naked.
Whoa, hang on a minute. Her eyes had skimmed the crowd but something, or rather someone, had caught her attention, and she quickly reversed her gaze.