I'm really nervous but I'm excited
Carrie Cobb suffers from the hereditary
life-threatening kidney disease today
carries life will forever change with
the latest knowledge skill and
technology of a dedicated UCLA
transplant team and a priceless gift
from her loving family Carrie discovered
she had inherited her father's
polycystic kidney when she was 20 and
she always knew that at some point her
kidneys would fail the cysts get large
they burst and she has kidney stone like
paint for anyone who's ever had kidney
stones they know that this is
excruciating the kidneys clean the blood
they filtered the blood and then produce
urine to get rid of the waste when your
kidneys start to fail toxins build up in
your blood you start to feel ill you may
have difficulty breathing and the
kidneys are responsible for maintaining
the interior the inside environment of
our bodies in a stable state because if
the inside environment of our body's
earnest and not in a stable state our
cells and our organs don't function
properly and that means we have to have
the right number of salts and water in
the body and it's a very delicate
balancing act everybody going into
kidney failure was able to get a
transplant I think that would be our
choice of therapy form form because
having a kidney transplant gives you
back normal kidney function I think the
exciting thing about transplantation is
is how successful it's become that the
main problem of course is just the
different the difference between supply
and demand that we have approaching
three-quarters of a million people on
dialysis and in a few years to come
seventy thousand people on the waiting
list and we only do ten to twelve
thousand kidney transplants a year of
those national figures UCLA is a leading
transplant center performing nearly 300
kidney transplants every year Carrie is
one of the lucky ones she will receive a
kidney from her brother when I think
about having his kidney I think about
the energy and a stamina
just being able to live at noon or
normal life without dialysis and without
feeling so exhausted I feel like I don't
remember what it feels like to feel good
anymore almost you know well Kerri and
David are an exceptional brother and
sister pair if you ever meet them you'll
you'll know that they have a particular
chemistry right off the bat I thought
that they should have a little a little
note from me in the operating room so
here we go Kerri was a very outgoing
person uh but she inherited disease and
it's been in her family she is was very
tough and she went along with it but her
kidneys became massively enlarged to the
point that they were very painful yeah
we're like a size two but my stomach's
thirty-five inches eventually the kidney
started to fail and she started to
become very weak it was just a given you
know when she needed it she needed a
kidney and mine were healthy that she
could have one of mine it's not a
decision you know it wasn't a question
hmm what should I do when you have a
kind of closeness and you know that we
have that I can't imagine it being any
other way with my sister in fact I've
said to her I said I I expect you to
expect it from me so it's very strange
when people say you're doing something
very heroic and you're doing something
so great for your sister and I just
don't I don't perceive it that way at
all not at all we have so many people in
this country who died waiting for organs
and especially in the case of kidney
transplants we all have to we really
function very beautifully on one I am
thankful of course I'm thankful but I'm
just thankful to have them as my brother
one of the biggest advances in kidney
transplantation at UCLA is the way the
kidney can be retrieved from living
donors like David I think the biggest
change has been the introduction of the
laparoscopic donor nephrectomy because
of the benefits of transplantation more
and more people are considered good
candidates for a kidney transplant and
we simply don't have enough kidneys to
go around for everyone so more and more
people have come forward to donate a
kidney
and this laparoscopic approach has
allowed them to donate with the very
little pain and suffering we place small
instruments into the abdominal cavity
through ports which are sort of like
straws and we have very small television
cameras and instruments which then go
through those ports and into the
abdominal cavity using the television
camera to see what is happening on the
inside of the body we can divide the the
ureter and then the blood vessels in
order to extract the kidney we make a
small incision over the pubic bone and
this allows us to remove the kidney
through a small incision in an area of
the body that's not too painful the good
news is the transplants are very very
successful the rates of success
excellent we are achieving nineteen
ninety-five percent success and kidneys
allows me lost in a long time we're
doing more and more transplants from
living donors patients do have to take
medications but these days the
medications are getting easier to deal
with and the complication rates are
diminished dr. Peter Shula Matt his team
removed David's left kidney through this
minimally invasive laparoscopic
technique and take the kidney into
Kerry's operating room where her kidneys
are being removed
doctors normally leave polycystic kidney
xin plays and add the donor organ but
carries disease kidneys are so enormous
they must come out to make room they are
many times their normal weight and
covered
insists doctor Grich at his team
meticulously so David small healthy
donor kidney into his sister Kari within
minutes it is working perfectly because
this is an inherited trait she's
fortunate that her disease will not
reoccur in the transplant so my hope for
Kari is that she will have a good kidney
function for many years to come we hope
that she can have a normal life now six
weeks later Kari like thousands of UCLA
organ recipients before her he's on the
mend and prepares for a new life ahead I
think the most significant advance for
the public is that transplantation has
become extraordinarily safe and
successful but half the live donor
transplant such as Kerry received will
last at least 20 years which really is
quite outstanding the kidney transplant
really does give you a completely new
lease on life for us I know you know in
our business doctors nurses all of us
nothing gives us more gratification in
facilitating a successful family or
living donor transplant it is very
gratifying and and it's if you like to
see how well Kerry is doing I am feeling
so much better it's really been amazing
so I really think that it's just a
matter of time before you know kidneys
are lasting the rest of people's lives
instead of you know five ten twenty
years
they're just lasting forever I have all
the confidence that that these kinds of
developments are just going to continue
there's so much time and effort spent by
these amazing doctors to do that so it's
a great thing it's really amazing it's
very very miraculous
you