New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is on two missions. One is to cream the Giants in the upcoming Super Bowl game; the other is to obtain a new kidney for his lifelong mentor Tom Martinez. Thus, he is reaching out to his fans for help. Brady has known the esteemed quarterback coach since he was a young boy and credits his 68 year old mentor with teaching him the basics and complexities of football that have led him to a fifth Super Bowl.
The Patriots quarterback, who takes on the Giants February 5 in a repeat of Super Bowl XLII, continues to make trips to Martinez's California home to discuss his game, with Martinez unable to travel because of his failing health. Now Jersey Number 12 is doing all he can to help his beloved friend, beginning with a recent Facebook appeal which drastically raised the profile of Martinez's kidney search through publicizing MatchingDonors.com. Facebook’s CEO, Paul Dooley, said Brady's support resulted in an increase in the number of potential donors who have come forward. "Tom is a great guy and has given us great visibility," Dooley said.
While none proved a match for Martinez, Dooley said they may provide a lifeline for one of the other thousands of people searching for donors. More than 110,000 patients currently are waiting for an organ transplant in the US. According to MatchingDonors.com, 19 people die every day in the US while waiting for a kidney transplant, with most holding on for seven to nine years. Only 23,749 organ transplants were performed between January and October last year, according to the United Network for Organ Sharing.
It is possible that Martinez could wind up at UCLA Ronald Reagan Medical Center. If so, he will be in good hands. According to government data released last year, patients who received kidney transplants through the UCLA Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Program had the highest three-year transplant survival rate among patients who underwent the procedure at U.S. centers that perform 80 or more transplants per year. Since 1964, more than 6,000 kidney transplants have been performed at UCLA; these include combined kidney-liver, heart-liver and multi-organ transplants. The kidney and pancreas program now performs about 300 transplants each year, said Dr. Alan Wilkinson, director of the program. He noted, “We achieve these results in spite of taking on very high-risk patients — some with complex medical problems and others at high risk of having rejection.” About 92% of patients who received kidneys at Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center had functioning transplants three years after their surgeries, according to data compiled by the Scientific Registry for Transplant Recipients, which monitors national transplant data for the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The statistics examine one-month, one-year and three-year survival rates.
The three-year statistics are the most important measure of patient outcomes because they include both early and late patient-survival rates, according to Dr. Gabriel Danovitch, medical director of the UCLA Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Program. “We are, of course, extremely proud of this achievement,” Dr. Danovitch said. “We greatly appreciate the wonderful teamwork and devotion that goes into the program from each of its members and the ongoing support from the hospital and the David Geffen School of Medicine.”
The UCLA Kidney and Pancreas Transplant Program has earned a national reputation for its clinical and academic excellence and is recognized as a national leader in clinical research. A part of UCLA Transplantation Services, the program represents a collaboration of transplant physicians in the division of nephrology at the David Geffen School of Medicine, surgeons from the department of urology's division of transplant surgery, and Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center. The program has pioneered the use of laparoscopic nephrectomy for harvesting kidneys from live donors, making the procedure much less invasive for those donating an organ.
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