DONATING A SECOND CHANCE

Ohio University sophomore (and Backdropper) Maya Meade shares her journey on what it’s like to be a living kidney donor.

BY SOPHIA ENGLEHART | ILLUSTRATION BY ABIGAIL SUMMERS

Maya Meade, a sophomore studying journalism and minoring in political science at Ohio University, is an organ donor. For Meade, it is more than a heart icon stamped on her driver’s license. Meade is a living donor, which means that she is choosing to donate one of her kidneys to almost a complete stranger while she is still living.

“I don’t know him personally, the person that’s getting the kidney. I have never met him,” Meade says. This all started when Meade was babysitting for a woman who was trying to get a kidney donation for her father.

“She found out that she was not approved to do the surgery,” Meade says. “And I was like, ‘Well, I know that you mentioned that your blood type was A negative; mine is, too. And since you couldn’t do this donation, I’ll at least go through the testing to see if I can do it.’” With that, Meade started the process of becoming a living organ donor and is scheduled to donate her kidney in May.

“[It was] really spur of the moment,” Meade says. “When I offered it to her, I hadn’t really thought it through, but I just had the idea and I said it to her and I was like, ‘It could happen.’”

According to the Donate Life Ohio website, living organ donation is a process when an individual voluntarily decides to donate an organ of choice to another person. That type of donation differs from a normal donation process, which usually occurs when a registered organ donor dies and their organs are utilized for living patients in need of a transplant.

“For people to get a living donor, the benefits [are that it] generally decreases your time on waiting for an organ because ... you can wait three to five years on the deceased donor list,” says Dana Mason, a former transplant social worker and the Independent Living Donor Advocate at Ohio State University.

Mason says another benefit of a living donor is that they can undergo more tests and thus give more information about themselves.

Mason works with donors to help them throughout the process of finding a recipient. Living Donor is a program directly affiliated with Ohio State University hospitals and consists of both a Living Kidney and Living Liver Donor program.

The first step in the process of living organ donation is having matching blood types. Before the actual donation, living organ donors have to complete a series of qualifications, including a urine test, antibody screening, a psychological evaluation and other medical tests. At OSU, donors also have to be approved by a patient selection committee, which is when members of every medical department evaluate if the transplant should go through or if the organ should be donated to another person on the waiting list.

This was the case for Meade, who is undergoing what she described as “a domino effect,” or what doctors call a kidney paired donation (KPD). Instead of directly donating to the original recipient, Meade’s kidney will be going to another, younger donor in need. Then that individual’s original donor will be giving their kidney to Meade’s original recipient. Due to her age compared to her recipient, Meade’s kidney has a longer life span and will benefit a younger patient in need of the kidney more than the original, older recipient.

“In that situation, what happens is you have one set of a donor and recipient. They [OSU] don’t feel that it’s not the right blood ... or tissue type or ... it may make more sense to have that organ go to a younger person,” Mason says. “Then what happens is you have another group of two people and they switched the donors.”

Most bodies have a pair of kidneys that act as a filter for the organs, flushing out waste and cleaning the bloodstream. Typically, one kidney is used in the transplant process, and the remaining kidney is able to fully compensate for the rest of the body.

“What happens is that [the] remaining kidney kind of increases in size to pick up the slack,” Mason says. “They won’t have the same level of kidney function ... but ... you gain about 75 percent to 80 percent of that kidney function [back].”

Kidney donations, as stated by the U.S. Department of Health & Human Services, are the organs in highest demand for transplants, with currently 91,109 Americans waiting to receive a kidney. According to Mason, 3,011 people in Ohio are waiting for a transplant, and 2,246 of those are waiting for a kidney transplant.

Meade had to go through several physical and psychological tests which she was able to complete them last semester while staying in her hometown of Oxford.

“I started the process in August,” Meade says. “I think I had my first tests in September and then I was approved at the beginning of December. So it took a couple of months to do all of the tests.”

Through the process of undergoing tests and prepping for donating, Meade’s family and the family she offered to donate have been a big source of support.

“They’re supportive, but obviously they’re just nervous,” Meade says. “I’ve never had to do any kind of surgery and if they can’t come with me because of COVID, I think my mom might be very upset.”

Despite having never been part of a major surgery, the transplant surgery is the last worry on Meade’s mind. Because of coronavirus protocol in hospitals, Meade will not be permitted to have visitors after she gets out of surgery or during the three days she will be in recovery, which is something she admits is stressful.

“I’m not really afraid anything will go wrong,” she says. “But I think if I do have to do it alone, that’s kind of the scariest part. I don’t really want to have to stay in the hospital for three days alone.”

As the countdown to Meade’s transplant surgery begins and things become more and more real, Meade hasn't wavered in her resolve.

“When I told them [my parents] at first,they were like, ‘Why aren’t you like scared?’ I said, ‘There’s not really any reason to be scared,’” Meade says. “I had no reason not to. I just wanted to help someone that needed it.” b

Maya Meade is Backdrop's social media coordinator and event planner and next years editor-in- cheif.