Capt. Lisa Smurr, left, shares a laugh with Capt. Lisa Horak, who gave her a kidneymore than six years after they met at an Army officer camp.
Posted on 01/30/2005 7:13:55 PM PST by Former Military Chick
Capt. Lisa Smurr, left, shares a laugh with Capt. Lisa Horak, who gave her a kidneymore than six years after they met at an Army officer camp.
An Army nurse's promised gift to another Soldier is proving a good match.
When Capt. Lisa Smurr couldn't locate a healthy kidney to replace her failing pair last year, a nurse at Walter Reed Army Medical Center wouldn't offer simple condolences.
On July 22, Capt. Lisa Horak gave Smurr an extended lease on life when her left kidney became the other's second on the right. The average kidney transplant survives 18 years. A near perfectly matching organ -- doctors described Horak's match as twin-like -- could last twice as long.
Smurr, meanwhile, has gotten another important continuation. Just before Christmas, the Army deemed her fit for duty although previously telling her she would be discharged, and she intends, three kidneys and a determined will, to stay in uniform. The service's health benefits also allow Smurr to receive two pricey drugs that help prevent her body's rejecting the new kidney.
It's a story that can mist over even the meanest grunt, because it is a classic story of the enduring bond between Army buddies.
The two Lisas weren't strangers. Horak and Smurr met early in the military. They were platoon mates for five weeks during a Reserve Officer Training Corps advanced camp, after which assignments scattered them to opposite ends of the Army.
Over six years later, the Army moved Horak to Walter Reed from an Army hospital in Hawaii. Smurr's kidneys failed while she was stationed in Landstuhl, Germany, and the Army re-assigned her to Walter Reed where she could undergo specialized treatment.
That's when former pals became friends connected at the hip.
"I'm feeling good. I'm not ready for a [physical fitness] test, but I feel better each day," Smurr said recently while chatting with Horak on Walter Reed's Ward 67. "I had no concept of how sick I was before the operation. It was such a gradual, slow process."
Color has returned to her previously ashen face. She takes to the gym for cardio workouts, and looks forward to strength training, the area in which she most needs improvement after four months of doctor-imposed ease.
"I'll feel incredible once I regain my strength," she predicted.
A follow-up procedure in September to repair a constriction in her renal artery rated12 on a pain scale to 10, Smurr admits with a laugh. After shaking off the anesthesia, she felt as if her insides had been unchivalrously pummeled. But the pain was what she expected. Life doesn't come cheap -- a crash lesson she learned dearly before her unanticipated rendezvous with the past.
Horak says the procedure was exactly as she expected as well.
"I knew the whole process. Part of my job is to tell patients what they can expect in surgery," said Horak, who without hesitation shows her three dime-sized scars and one fish-hook incision at the naval
which is shorter than the procedure's name; laparoscopic nephrectomy.
Donating a kidney is not nearly as life-altering as receiving one. Horak says she felt somewhat lackluster after surgery, but has built herself up again. She drinks (vino still a favorite), travels (Key West was gorgeous) and eats as before.
Smurr's incision was longer, and she required a second incision to borrow an artery from her thigh in the follow-up procedure
Although Smurr lives with a controlled diet, she has developed a few new tastes.
Smurr admits she now regularly craves cinnamon Pop-Tarts, a treat she didn't seek out before. Horak has always enjoyed them.
"I told her that's my kidney that wants it," said Horak.
Both had visitors for the surgery, and they finally meet each other's family. Smurr's mother received a kidney transplant three years ago and is doing well. Smurr inherited a proclivity for the kidney disease.
What some might view as a harrowing process is shared like girls' night out among the good-humored pair.
A week before the procedure, they hosted a "kidney party" for good luck. Guests were served kidney beans, red jellybeans, and a red-velvet cake cut to resemble the organ d'être.
Horak jokingly says she uses an I'm-one-kidney-short argument when asked to help on tedious jobs. Smurr chuckles at being called "three-bean."
Yet, the soul-stirring reality of their situation is always just below the surface. Smurr's body could reject the kidney at any time. Horak has given a kidney to someone she's about to move far away from.
Both unabashedly draw on their faith.
"God has a purpose. He'll take care of me. I just have to put my faith in him," said Smurr, briefly on a serious bent.
Horak will step out of uniform this March, and plans to move nearer to family in Florida. That means she'll leave her nursing position on Walter Reed's wards 66 and 67. With Smurr's fit-for-duty approval, she plans to continue in the Army. That might mean she'd stay on at Walter Reed as an out-patient occupational therapist.
It definitely means the pair will be split.
"We're done," said Horak, stiffening her face in mock coolness and slicing her hand through the air.
They both grin.
"We have a bond that will be there thick or thin for the rest of our lives," she added. "And, I guess some day my kids will want to know what happened to my kidney."
"We'll stay friends," Smurr agreed confidently, looking over at the lady she views, all kidding aside, as a guardian angel.
In the end this is an ethical discussion. I mean, if you want to sign your donor card -- it expresses what you want your wishes to be.
But, there are folks on the waiting list some for years. If a solder was to die would his organs not go to the next name on the transplant list? Are you causing the program to go off balanced? Anyway, I would love to hear others thoughts on the subject.
All you have to do is read about this fine your man Home From The War In Iraq, Marine Faces The Fight Of His Life (heart wrenching) who served our country and now is ill requiring the gift of life.
I was unaware of what the regs are on this but I did hope that at least it was encouraged through the ranks.
The ethical question is of course that one cannot buy an organ or in anyway try to jump those on the list. I do not know if a military donor expressed his wishes as it pertains to his organs. While this is the most selfless gift one can make the liberal media would just distort this to high heaven.
Lastly, an organ to stay viable to the receiving patient must receive the organ within hours making it tough if a military member were to die and wanted his organ to give the gift of life.
**ping**
A wonderful gift of life story..You will be happy to know the Marine has received a liver transplant.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1332306/posts
"Leave message for ill Marine -- I'll deliver thread to Loma Linda University Hospital"
Thank you for the wonderful comment and link. We have amazing men and woment in the military, I salute them all.
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