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Thomas Koontz of Spotsylvania donated
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BY JIM HALL
A surgeon at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore removed Thomas Koontz's left kidney June 15.
That operation began a chain of surgeries that would last three weeks and involve eight pairs of donors and recipients and 16 kidneys in four cities.
When it was completed earlier this week, the exchange was the nation's largest paired-donor kidney swap.
Members of the transplant team at Johns Hopkins described Koontz, a 54-year-old resident of Spotsylvania County, as an "altruistic donor," since he was not paired with a recipient.
"Koontz basically said, 'I'll donate my kidney to anyone
"Thomas essentially starts the dominoes falling," Montgomery added.
Koontz--friends call him Dody--is a retired Marine who works now for the Department of Energy. He and his wife, Karen, and their three teens, Sage, Ehren and Ryan, live in the Mineral Springs section of the county.
Koontz said he first considered kidney donation after reading in the parish bulletin at St. Patrick's Catholic Church in Spotsylvania that another church member needed a transplant.
The church member eventually received a kidney, but Koontz pursued the idea of donating to a stranger in gratitude for his daughter's recovery from brain surgery.
"You only need one kidney," he reasoned.
Sage Koontz, now a second-year student at the University of Virginia, was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2007 and underwent successful surgery at Mary Washington Hospital in Fredericksburg.
"Sage was the inspiration for all this," Koontz said yesterday, recovering at his home. "I was trying to give back to God."
Koontz contacted Johns Hopkins last December and began what would be months of scans, tests and interviews.
Finally, he got a call from Hopkins officials in early June, saying that he was cleared to be a donor and that a multi-hospital exchange had been arranged to begin two weeks later.
Johns Hopkins has been a leader in paired-donation transplants, performing the nation's first in 2001. The procedure combines donors and recipients who are not compatible by blood or tissue with others in the same predicament.
On the day of Koontz's surgery, his kidney was removed in the morning and placed inside a stranger, Kathleen Wolstenholme, 52, that afternoon.
Wolstenholme's sister, Theresa Watson, 53, was willing to be a donor, but she was not a match for her sister, so she gave a kidney to Robert Brinkmann, 58.
Brinkmann's wife, Lisa Brinkmann, 58, was not a match for her husband, so she gave a kidney to Daniel Bruce, 57.
With this exchange, kidneys started going back and forth between Hopkins and hospitals in Detroit, St. Louis and Oklahoma City.
In each case, the recipient was paired with a donor, usually a spouse or family member, who had agreed to donate to a stranger so their sick loved one could receive one.
The final "domino" fell on July 6, when a kidney donated by Christine Hargis, 37, at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis was flown to Hopkins and implanted in an anonymous recipient, who had been waiting on the national transplant list.
All of the donors and recipients are doing well, Hopkins officials said.
Koontz's surgery was done laparoscopically through small incisions. He has a 6-inch scar below his naval and three smaller ones on his left side.
He was in the hospital for three days. He said he's still a little sore but doing well. He will return to work and resume jogging Monday.
His kidney was apparently a good match for Wolstenholme. He was told she was producing urine the next day.
Jim Hall: 540/374-5433
Email: jhall@freelancestar.com
