12-Year Old Meets 53-Year Old Kidney Donor

A 12-year old boy has finally met up with the 53-year old man who donated a kidney for him to live a healthier life, the Daily Mail reports.

Tom Higgs is the first person at Great Ormond Street Hospital in London to receive a kidney from a selfless donor. On most occasions, family members are the ones who are open to donating kidneys but there have been some instances wherein strangers have also done the good deed. Tom met his donor, a general practitioner from Portsmouth, after the two exchanged letters through their transplant coordinators. Tom has suffered from a rare type of kidney disease, atypical hemolytic uremic syndrome (HUS), since he was five years old. Tom has needed dialysis every night for the last five years and was put on the list for a donor at the age of eight.

Tom's mother, Vicky, said: "Those years on dialysis were very stressful and restrictive on our lives. We knew that he was really poorly and would eventually need a transplant. I had to set up the dialysis machine and get Tom on it by seven in the evening every night so he would be off it in time to get ready for school the next morning. I need to change his dressings before attaching him to the machine and also had to give him weekly injections. It was heartbreaking knowing how much Tom disliked all of this, but we had no choice as his kidneys weren't working and we had to filter his blood."

"Our lives have changed so much it's hard to believe. Before the transplant, we had to wait for Tom to come off the machine so we could get together and open our presents around the Christmas tree. On his birthdays, we usually brought his presents up to his room. Christmas is different now, and Tom is definitely looking forward to the celebrations this year."