The Human Spirit: Altruism - a Hanukka story

December 9, 2004

By BARBARA SOFER

Fewer than 100 Americans donated kidneys to friends or strangers last year. I know one of them. Katie Edelstein is a vivacious mother of four who manages a construction company with her husband, Dave, in Bellingham, Washington.

Last Hanukka, like most of us for whom our bean-shaped, fist-sized organs are working fine, Katie wasn't thinking about kidneys. She was making latkes, polishing hanukkiot, and painstakingly choosing presents. She couldn't have guessed that she would soon offer the most personal of gifts, her kidney, to a woman she hardly knew.

After Hanukka, Katie flew to New York to participate in a routine Hadassah national board meeting. As 200 women took seats in a hotel conference room, the National president, June Walker, strayed from the printed agenda: Board member Belle Simon from Long Island needed a kidney and asked that members inquire about donors among their far-flung communities. A shared sigh of sympathy passed through the room, and then the women turned back to project planning and budgets.

Katie couldn't concentrate. She remembered Belle from a meeting in Washington nine years earlier: "Such a nice woman." Then an outrageous idea made Katie shiver. "I can give her one of my kidneys."

Katie waited for a counterargument to overcome her impulse, but none did. Instead, she thought, "How many times do you get an opportunity to help another person in such a personal way?"
Katie fidgeted in her chair. Should I mention it? Not unless I'm sure I'm fully committed. Nothing less.

When the members broke for coffee, Katie crossed the room and approached Belle. Her hands and voice were trembling. "I'm interested," Katie said, and a wave of calm followed the words.

Belle was overwhelmed and mumbled something about getting more information. The meeting resumed, and from across the room Belle passed a folded note. It read, "Regardless of what happens, I can never thank you enough."

BELLE SIMON, a trim, dark-haired teacher, played tennis three times a week until she was 60. A yearly physical revealed moderately high blood pressure, and her doctor recommended she shrink her salt shaker and return for check-ups every three months. At one check-up, the physician revealed that he hadn't wanted to worry her, but in addition to blood pressure, he was monitoring her creatinine, a chemical waste molecule generated from muscle metabolism, filtered out by healthy kidneys. Her level was edging towards dangerous. A specialist detected glomerulonephritis - inflammation of the filtering units - possibly caused by an untreated childhood streptococcus infection.

The diagnosis stunned Belle, who felt fit. But the predicted symptoms struck quickly. She began nodding off in meetings. First tennis disappeared, then driving, lest she fall asleep at the wheel. By spring, Simon couldn't form matza balls for Pessah. She was nauseous, and all she wanted to do was sleep.

The next week, a technician connected Belle to a dialysis machine and henceforth, every Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday, her blood was cleaned. On her 65th birthday, Belle's husband, four children, and grandchildren planned a party, but Belle cut it short to go for dialysis. Soon after, she put her name on the list for kidney transplantation, to receive an organ from someone who had died. The wait would be five or six years, and she might be too old to be a good candidate.

And then Katie stepped up, and everything changed. On the way home, Katie stopped at her daughter's home in Detroit, where she talked by phone with a transplant coordinator at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Her daughter asked why Katie needed the information. She didn't have a good answer. At home, Dave gave her support. "We've been together for 31 years. You've never done anything crazy."

The blood tests came back: Katie and Belle were compatible. Her best friend and her children tried to convince Katie that you don't do something this drastic for someone you hardly know. Ironically, through frequent coast-to-coast calls, she and Belle were becoming good friends.
In May, together they entered Mount Sinai Hospital. A surgeon removed Katie's left kidney, wrapped it in ice, and carried it into the operating room where Belle lay. Four hours later, the kidney was nested with Belle's faulty ones. Immediately it began filtering her blood. When Belle awoke, Katie was in the next bed. Both women made quick recoveries.

I'm one of the luckiest women alive, Belle says.

She's right: 40,000 patients are awaiting a transplant in the United States. In small Israel, more than 1,000 people are waiting for transplants. At this time of year, corneas are delivered to Israel from the United States and Europe because ophthalmologists there take winter vacation.
Because of the generosity of others, Hanukka has become a genuine holiday of light for so many here. Few of us are as altruistic and brave as Katie, but we can at least - in this Hanukka season of giving and miracles - make good on our intentions to sign organ donor (Adi) cards to make sure that gift-giving goes beyond our lifetimes.