Community Corner

Brighton Resident Thankful for Gift of Kidney From Teenager

Transplant doctors say it's crucial to spread the word about organ donation and not just during April's Organ Donor Awareness Month.

For the past 3 1/2 years, Andrea Langhor, a mother of five and a grandmother to five, has been keenly aware that it was someone's child who saved her life.

After suffering for many years from a genetic kidney disease, Langhor, a Brighton resident, was told by her doctors in September of 2009 that she would have to start dialysis until she was able to receive a kidney transplant.

It was disheartening news for the then 51-year-old grandmother of five who had watched her own father receive dialysis treatments for the same polycystic kidney disease and knew what her future could look like.

Find out what's happening in Brightonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“You’re just existing,” Langhor, now 55, said. “You’re really not living on dialysis.”

Just a week later however, Langhor received “miraculous” news that after only six months on the donor registry, she was a match and would receive her life-changing transplant. She would later learn that the kidney came from a teenager.

Find out what's happening in Brightonwith free, real-time updates from Patch.

“... we were a perfect match,” Langhor said. “... (doctors) told me I had won the lottery because that’s like one in a million.”

Today there are more than 2,500 people in Michigan awaiting a kidney, an organ transplant that will prolong their lives, according to Dr. Shakir Hussein, of Dearborn.

The transplant surgeon at Detroit Medical Center's Harper University Hospital said there are not enough living or deceased donors and that is why it's crucial to spread the word about the need and not just during April, which is designated as organ donation awareness month. 

The good news, Hussein said, is that new technology no longer requires people to be a perfect match. He said a "paired kidney exchange" allows for a bigger pool of candidates who don't have to be a blood or antibody match.

"Although (donation) is psychologically and physically difficult, it really is a precious gift, Hussein said. "It saves lives."

Langhor's life was saved by a 17-year-old girl from New Jersey who died from a brain aneurysm. Her parents made the decision to donate her organs.

“She was her parent’s only child,” Langhor said. “Her dad had had a kidney transplant 22 years earlier and that’s why they wanted to do that.”

In a letter she received from the family, which Langhor said she read through tears, the mother had explained that many people had questioned why they would choose to donate their daughter’s organs.

“And what she told them,” Langhor said, “was if he (the woman's husband) hadn’t had that transplant, they wouldn’t have enjoyed 17 wonderful years with their daughter.”

Langhor said she and her family are grateful for the choice that was made which gave her a “second chance at life,” but it was a comment made by her husband of more than 30 years that brought her tears.

"He said that the donor family didn’t just save you, they saved our whole family,” Langhor said.


Get more local news delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up for free Patch newsletters and alerts.

We’ve removed the ability to reply as we work to make improvements. Learn more here