‘Cracker blast victim’s kidneys go to ailing broadcaster
MANILA—A 12-year-old boy who died after a pile of unexploded firecrackers he and a friend had collected blew up in their faces has become the country’s first pediatric kidney donor to an adult patient, health officials said Monday.
Health Secretary Enrique Ona. FILE PHOTO
Health Secretary Enrique Ona said at a news briefing that the parents of John Kenneth Deniega, the blast victim, donated their son’s kidneys to a 64-year-male radio commentator, a diabetic suffering from end-stage renal disease.
The transplant was successfully performed at the National Kidney and Transplant Institute on January 4, giving the adult patient a new lease in life.
“This is our first transplantation of pediatric donor kidneys to an adult recipient,” Ona said, noting that two kidneys from the pediatric donor weighing 36 kilograms were successfully transplanted into an 85-kg adult recipient.
Shortly after the New Year revelry, the donor and a playmate suffered severe head and body injuries when unexploded firecrackers they had collected blew up in their faces.
The blast hurled Deniega up in the air, with his head slamming against the pavement as he fell. The blast tore off part of his face and doctors declared him brain dead the following day.
His friend lost both hands and an eye but survived the explosion.
A referral from the Manila Central University Medical Center, where blast victim was confined, was sent to the Human Organ Preservation Effort (HOPE), the organ procurement organization of the NKTI officially accredited by the Department of Health.
The child’s parents volunteered to donate the organs.
In appreciation of the family’s heroism, HOPE helped in the family’s hospital obligations and made contributions to the funeral expenses, Ona said.
Transplantation of organs from brain dead patients is among the priority programs of the Department of Health.
From current statistical data, kidney failure alone accounts for around 20,000 patients who can benefit from transplantation, the treatment of choice for kidney failure.
Sixty-eight percent of dialysis patients suffer from complications of two common conditions, diabetes mellitus (40%) and hypertension (28%).
Unlike kidney failure where dialysis remains an option, the lives of countless patients with end-stage diseases of other organs can be saved only through transplantation.
In 2013, 72 transplants from deceased donors were performed, a 20-percent increase from the 2012 organ donation rate, NKTI and HOPE said.
Last year also marked the Philippines’ first-ever small bowel transplant with the organ procured by NKTI and HOPE and allocated by the Philippine Network for Organ Sharing (PhilNOS) of the DOH.
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