Liver transplant gives Redlander second chance

The San Bernardino Sun | Laurie Williams
Separated by decades in age and by most of a continent in distance, a 70-year-old Redlands woman and a 1-year-old boy from Lafayette, La., have a lot in common.

Until recently, for example, both were among 17,000 patients nationwide waiting for liver transplants, fighting to survive long enough to receive a second chance at life.

Last month, their families both received long-awaited calls. One available donor liver was a good match for both of them. Several successful surgeries later, Karen Torrey and baby Matthew, whose last name was not released, both have part of the organ.

“We’re alive because of this,” Torrey said on Monday at Ochsner Multi-Organ Transplant Institute in New Orleans, where the liver transplants were performed.
______________________________________________________
"You have the power to SAVE lives."
To register as a donor in California:
www.donateLIFEcalifornia.org | www.doneVIDAcalifornia.org
Outside California:
www.organdonor.gov | www.donatelife.