'You are never too old for a transplant' says Corkman who got a 'new lease of life' at 77
Organ recipient Donal O'Flynn, pictured at CUH during Organ Donor Awareness Week, urges others to never give up, saying 'you are never too old for a transplant'. Picture: Denis Minihane
Donal O’Flynn’s kidney transplant four years ago gave the 77-year-old a “new lease of life”, following nine years travelling to Cork University Hospital (CUH) from his home in Ovens, Co Cork, for dialysis.
“I just can’t get over how healthy I am now," he said. "It is such a gift. I put in a full day’s work, I’m always doing something at home, building or knocking down walls.
“And I can eat what I like — before, you couldn’t eat potatoes, peas, beans, rashers, sausages, coffee... As an Irish man I like potatoes, and I didn’t touch a potato for just over nine years.”
He urged older people with illnesses to ‘never give up’, saying: “you are never too old for a transplant".
"People think ‘I’m too old, they wouldn’t waste an organ on me’ but when I can get it at 77 years of age, anyone can do it.”
Organ donations doubled at CUH last year, with 20 transplant operations carried out altogether across the South/SouthWest Hospital Group (SSWHG) in Cork, Kerry, Tipperary, and Waterford.
In 2020, the hospital group carried out 15 transplants, while 16 such surgeries were conducted in 2019.
Organ donor nurse manager Breda Doyle said: “We are proud that we have managed to maintain the numbers in 2020 and managed to increase in 2021 despite Covid-19 and the challenges that it posed.”
There are just under 600 people on the national waiting lists for organs. Donations are offered first to patients in Ireland, then to the British system and Eurotransplant.
“Once a family has given us the very generous offer that they would like their family member to donate an organ, there is every effort made to place the organ with a suitable recipient,” she said.
The hospital group is currently running a campaign under the hashtag #7LivesSaved to let the public know that anyone could donate up to seven organs on their death.
Adrian Murphy, emergency medicine consultant at CUH and clinical lead for organ donation at the SSWHG, said donors and their families play a crucial role in this.
Dr Murphy urged anyone considering donation to make sure their family knows.
“I can carry an organ donor card in my wallet, and, God forbid, if something catastrophic happens to me, the staff at the hospital will approach my next of kin,” said Dr Murphy. "But even if I carry the card and have signed the card, the next of kin can refuse the process.
“Just carrying the card doesn’t automatically imply that somebody will become an organ donor.”
Legislation in Ireland for organ donation has long been considered. Dr Murphy said in other countries this has shown only “marginal improvements” in donation rates.
Leslie Solo, a 56-year-old nurse at St Finbarr’s Hospital, had her kidney transplant in 2020. Although recovered, she is not yet back at work due to Covid-19.
“I am so blessed. I am so thankful to my donor, it’s a blessing from God,” she said.
“I was thinking before I might not get a match here because I am Asian, that it might not match. My doctor told me if I stayed here, I would get called.”
Double transplant recipient Colette Sweeney also worked as a nurse at CUH for five years.
“I had a kidney and pancreas transplant together,” she said 13 years on. "I’m not using insulin anymore, and I’m off dialysis. There is freedom and normality about having a transplant that you don’t take for granted."
Known as an SPK (simultaneous pancreas and kidney transplant), this can only be done under certain circumstances to maintain the kidney’s health.
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