Articles from prior issues of The Advocate

March/April 2001

National Organ/Tissue Donor Awareness Week is April 15-21, 2001.
"I hope the story below will encourage all of you to make the decision to sign a donor card and give the gift of life."
by Maureen Halsey-Wright, Organ Donor/Transplant Coordinator


Thousands of Americans are in need of vital organ and tissues. For many, the chance to live a full life won’t come unless many more of us consider organ and tissue donation. Discuss organ donation with your family and friends. Help others find a chance to live a full life. Talk to your family about organ donation. Talk to your family about donating LIFE. Deadly Tornado Takes Life; Gives Life The television screen over 24-year-old Dana Pritchett’s hospital bed at Integris Baptist Medical Center in Oklahoma City beeped incessantly as frantic weathermen urged residents in the area to take cover immediately. The radar images showed angry red blotches where they said tornadoes had touched down. “I was hoping they wouldn’t hit the hospital,” Dana remembered. Dana had been admitted to the hospital for surgery to repair an umbilical cord hernia. More than a year previously she had delivered a son, Dylan, even though she learned in 1992 that her liver was being destroyed by her own immune system and that she would eventually need a liver transplant. Doctors were worried that neither she, nor the baby, would survive, because of her liver disease. Dana had delivered her son seven weeks early, but both she and her baby were fine.

The hernia repair was supposed to be routine surgery, but Dana’s life took a different turn shortly after the tornadoes hit the area. Blood work showed that her condition had worsened in just a few days. Her liver was failing fast.

Meanwhile, as the tornado warnings were being broadcast, 19-year-old Kelly Cox was frantically trying to reach her mother, Suzanne. The weather was moving toward the small community of Bridge Creek, northeast of Chickasha, where her 55-year-old mother shared a mobile home with her five dogs and two cats. The phone was busy. The residents in Bridge Creek had seen lots of stormy weather before. But this storm was different. It had a different look about it. It even felt different. They had no way of knowing that the tornado bearing down on them would be the most violent ever recorded. It slammed into the tiny community like a great wind-borne hammer disintegrating homes, tossing cars and trucks like they were toys, and killing and injuring people. Only later, after talking to neighbors, did Kelly learn that her mother was among the critically injured.

Kelly Cox kept a vigil at her mother’s bedside at University Hospital, as the doctors and nurses did what they could. Her mother had suffered serious brain damage and even emergency surgery didn’t help. Tests eventually showed that blood had stopped flowing to her mother’s brain, and the doctors told Kelly she was brain-dead. Her three uncles had flown to Oklahoma City to be with her. But, Kelly faced a decision that would change her life, and the lives of many others; one she would have to make on her own. Samantha Mitchell, an organ recovery coordinator for the Oklahoma Organ Sharing Network, asked Kelly if she would donate her mother’s organs and tissues. Kelly had been an organ donor since she was old enough to make that decision, and she said her mother had told her she wanted to be an organ donor, too. Mitchell says there was no hesitation at all, Kelly said yes. Her uncles agreed. “I don’t regret it at all,” Kelly says. “My family feels the same way.” Back at Integris Baptist Medical Center, Dana Pritchett had been moved to the Intensive Care Unit. “The next day,” says Dana, “one of the liver transplant coordinators came in and asked me for my mother’s telephone number at work in Tulsa. When I asked him why, he said they had a potential liver donor for me.”

Dana Pritchett was taken to surgery at 10:30 p.m. Five-and-a-half hours later, surgeons put the last suture in place. Dana Pritchett had a new, healthy liver...from Suzanne Cox, Kelly's mom. When Kelly Cox saw Dana and her 16-month-old son on television shortly after the transplant, she figured her mom was Dana's donor. Kelly decided she wanted to meet Dana and her son. Arrangements were made for Kelly to visit with Dana and her family in her hospital room. She says she got to know Dana, and that Dana talked about her little boy. “I’ve had nearly 20 years with my mom,” says Kelly, “and it’s good to see that this little boy will have much longer with his mom.” There were many others who benefited from Suzanne Cox’s donation. Her heart saved the life of a patient in Louisiana, her kidneys were sent to patients who were waiting in Pittsburgh, and her corneas were recovered for patients in Oklahoma and New York, who were waiting to see clearly again.