SIBLINGS BY ADOPTION PROVE PERFECT MATCH.Byline: DENNIS McCARTHY Dennis McCarthy may refer to:
Call it divine intervention, a miracle, or just plain good luck, but 23 years after being adopted by a family as a 4-year-old, a Sherman Oaks woman turns out to be a perfect kidney donor match for her non-biological older brother dying of kidney failure kidney failure or renal failure Partial or complete loss of kidney function. Acute failure causes reduced urine output and blood chemical imbalance, including uremia. Most patients recover within six weeks. . ``It was like God knew what he was doing 23 years ago when he brought us all together,'' says Dana Armstead, who will donate one of her healthy kidneys to her brother, Derek, in an operation at UCLA Medical Center UCLA Medical Center is a hospital located on the campus of the University of California, Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California. It is rated as one of the top three hospitals in the United States and is the top hospital on the West Coast according to US News & World Report. next month. ``My mom called me up crying when the tests came back a match,'' she said. ``None of us could believe it. The only one in the family who was a match was me, and I was adopted. We were all flabbergasted flab·ber·gast tr.v. flab·ber·gast·ed, flab·ber·gast·ing, flab·ber·gasts To cause to be overcome with astonishment; astound. See Synonyms at surprise. [Origin unknown. .'' No one more than Derek, whose health had worsened to the point his dialysis treatments were no longer effective. Unless a donor was found soon, the doctors said, the prognosis was not good. So after five years of unsuccessfully waiting on the kidney transplant kidney transplant or renal transplant Replacement of a diseased or damaged kidney with one from a living relative or a legally dead donor. The former's tissue type is more likely to match, reducing the chance of rejection; but removal puts the donor at risk, list for a donor, Derek finally bowed to the wishes of his family last August, and allowed them to be tested as a possible kidney transplant match. The tests results came back negative. No one in his biological family was a match. ``I was pretty depressed, and figured that was it,'' said Derek, who has two sons, 7 and 12. ``Dana was over visiting, and said maybe she could be a match. ``I thought, Yeah, right, Sis See safety instrumented system. . The next day, she started the testing.'' It was a long shot, sure, but don't long shots sometimes hit? Dana told her brother, trying to cheer him up. That night, they both went to sleep sharing the same 23-year-old dream that brought them together as a family. She was the daughter of a female truck driver who loved the open road more than her, Dana says. When she was 4, her wanderlust mom left her behind on one of her cross-country trips, and never came back. ``I was living with a foster care family in Chico when the Armsteads came to visit me one weekend to see if they liked me,'' said Dana, a single mom with a 7-year-old daughter. Derek still remembers that first visit back in 1976, seeing this little girl wearing funny-looking glasses and a red and white dress. ``She looked like the sweetest thing I had ever seen in my life, and I told my mother I wanted her for my sister,'' he said. ``My brother, Dax, agreed.'' Shirley and Donald Armstead looked at their sons, and saw all they needed to see. Love. This little girl who the Children's Home children's home n → centro de acogida para niños children's home n → foyer m d'accueil (pour enfants) children's home n Society had found for them after they had placed an adoption request was perfect. ``Our family was mixed racially, and we wanted a daughter from the same background,'' Shirley said Friday. ``Dana's mother had been Caucasian, and her father African-American. ``We all took one look at her, and fell in love with her immediately,'' Shirley said. And that's how they became a family - how Derek Armstead finally got that little sister he and his brother always wanted. An adopted sister who would step forward 23 years later as the only one with a kidney that could save his life. Dana put down the phone last August, and gave a little shudder. The long shot was still in the race. The lab results were in. Derek's blood type matched hers. It was a start. ``I called over to the transplant team at UCLA UCLA University of California at Los Angeles UCLA University Center for Learning Assistance (Illinois State University) UCLA University of Carrollton, TX and Lower Addison, TX and asked where I went from here,'' said Dana, who works as a medical assistant and lab technician at UCLA Medical Group in Sherman Oaks. She was told the doctors would have to do a work-up. There would be tests and more tests. Blood tests, ultra sounds, X-rays, cross matching cross matching or crossmatching n. 1. A test for determining the compatibility between the blood of a donor and that of a recipient before transfusion; the clumping of red blood cells indicates incompatibility. 2. , everything. For more than a month she waited for that one phone call that said one of the tests had come up negative. It never came. They all came back positive. The long shot was coming in. Incredibly, the little girl the Armsteads adopted out of a Chico foster care home 23 years ago was a perfect kidney donor match for Derek. The operation is set for Feb. 22 at UCLA Medical Center. ``I spend my days trying to find the right words to tell Dana how much all this means to me,'' Derek said Friday, playing with his two young sons. ``It takes a whole lot of person to do what she's doing for me. How do you say thank you for such a precious gift? I don't know Don't know (DK, DKed) "Don't know the trade." A Street expression used whenever one party lacks knowledge of a trade or receives conflicting instructions from the other party. . I can't find the words. ``All I do know is that I love her unconditionally,'' Derek said. A National Transplant Assistance Fund has been established on behalf of Dana and Derek to help cover the costly post-surgery expenses that their insurance policies do not cover. For Derek, the money will go for the anti-infection medications he will need, and for Dana, financial help to tide this single mom with a young daughter over for the two months she will be off work recuperating from the transplant operation. Donations can be sent to the Transplant Fund in Honor of Derek Armstead, 6 Bryn Mawr Bryn Mawr (brĭn mär), uninc. town (1990 est. pop. 10,000), Montgomery co., SE Pa., a residential suburb of Philadelphia. It is the seat of Bryn Mawr College (for women), opened in 1885 by the Society of Friends. Avenue, P.O. Box 258, Bryn Mawr, PA 19010. The NTAF NTAF National Transplant Assistance Fund is a nonprofit organization Nonprofit Organization An association that is given tax-free status. Donations to a non-profit organization are often tax deductible as well. Notes: Examples of non-profit organizations are charities, hospitals and schools. , and all donations are tax deductible. CAPTION(S): Photo PHOTO From left, Shirley Armstead, her son Derek and adopted daughter, Dana, who will donate a kidney to her brother, await the operation, set for Feb. 22. Tina Gerson/Daily News |
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