Man Successfully Re-Gifts Kidney
By Samantha Abernethy in News on Apr 26, 2012 9:40PM
Chicago doctors managed to re-gift a kidney after a man's body rejected it. The certified pre-owned kidney was a donation from Ray Fearing's sister. When the 27-year-old's body refused it, doctors didn't want to toss out a perfectly good kidney, so they took a gamble on re-transplanting the organ into another person.
Northwestern nephrologist Lorenzo Gallon said there was science to back up the surgery, but no one had proven that a kidney potentially damaged after a transplant into one patient, would then work in another, just because the second patient didn’t have the medical problems of the first."If you have a surgeon who’s got the guts enough to do it, then go ahead and do it," Dr. Gallon said he was told while after consulting with ethicists and other doctors around the world and at Northwestern.
Northwestern Dr. Joseph Leventhal successfully transplanted the kidney to Erwin Gomez, a 67-year-old cardiovascular surgeon. It's been a year since the surgery, and Gomez and Fearing have met. Unfortunately Fearing is still on dialysis and seeking a donor. "It may not have been my time, but I am grateful that I was able to help another patient," he said.