{"id":79429,"date":"2023-04-12T04:00:59","date_gmt":"2023-04-12T08:00:59","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/?p=79429"},"modified":"2023-04-13T08:07:31","modified_gmt":"2023-04-13T12:07:31","slug":"utmc-delivers-christmas-miracle-for-man-in-need-of-kidney","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/04_12_2023\/utmc-delivers-christmas-miracle-for-man-in-need-of-kidney","title":{"rendered":"UTMC Delivers Christmas Miracle for Man in Need of Kidney"},"content":{"rendered":"

Shortly after Mark Kemeter woke up last Christmas morning he said a prayer for someone whose name he didn\u2019t know and whose face he\u2019d never seen.<\/p>\n

Kemeter, 67, had just received from them the gift of life \u2014 a new kidney.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a very spiritual experience,\u201d he said. \u201cI felt grateful. I prayed and thanked the donor and the donor\u2019s family, and I continue to do that today.\u201d<\/p>\n

More than three months after his transplant at The University of Toledo Medical Center, Kemeter is doing well. He\u2019s regaining his strength and, no longer reliant on dialysis to filter his blood, has a renewed sense of freedom.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy new kidney started working right away and I\u2019ve had zero issues,\u201d he said. \u201cThis is how I used to feel years ago, before dialysis. I feel like I can do anything and go anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"UTMC<\/a>

Mark Kemeter, right, with UTMC transplant surgeon Dr. Obi Ekwenna. Kemeter received a life-saving kidney transplant last Christmas at The University of Toledo Medical Center.<\/p><\/div>\n

Dr. Obi Ekwenna, a transplant and urologic surgeon who performed the procedure, has been thrilled with Kemeter\u2019s recovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cMark is doing fantastic,\u201d Ekwenna said. \u201cHe is a miracle in every sense of the word. He\u2019s had a really challenging medical history but he\u2019s such a positive person, despite everything he\u2019s been through.\u201d<\/p>\n

Born with extropy of the bladder, a rare disorder in which the abdominal wall that should enclose the bladder doesn\u2019t fully form, Kemeter underwent several major surgeries before his fourth birthday.<\/p>\n

Many of his earliest memories are of being in the hospital, and it wasn\u2019t a given, he said, that he\u2019d even survive to adulthood.<\/p>\n

He did, but by his early 60s, Kemeter\u2019s doctors told him his kidneys were beginning to deteriorate.<\/p>\n

After his kidney function dipped to 10%, he began home hemodialysis and was put on the wait list of a transplant center near his home in Belleville, Mich.<\/p>\n

Kemeter expected waiting three to five years for a transplant, devoting at least 25 hours a week to dialysis to keep him alive until a suitable donor could be found.<\/p>\n

A counselor at his dialysis clinic suggested he might be able to get transplanted sooner at UTMC, which has one of the fastest adult kidney transplant programs in the country.<\/p>\n

On Christmas Eve, just as he was finishing the day\u2019s dialysis and about eight months after he was listed, he got the call that UTMC had a kidney for him.<\/p>\n

Though the snowstorm that swept across the Midwest that day delayed the organ\u2019s arrival, pushing the transplant back a few hours, the procedure ultimately began a little before midnight.<\/p>\n

Kemeter ended up celebrating Christmas in the recovery room with a new kidney.<\/p>\n

\u201cI cannot recommend The University of Toledo Medical Center enough. It wasn\u2019t just the surgical part. It was my recovery, everything,\u201d he said. \u201cUTMC could not have been better for me.\u201d<\/p>\n

On average, patients at UTMC spend a little more than four months between being listed and receiving a transplant. Nationally, the median wait time is nearly three years.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to make sure we\u2019re getting the proper kidney for each specific patient. Sometimes that can take a couple extra months, but he\u2019s doing terrific,\u201d Ekwenna said. \u201cHe\u2019s off dialysis and pretty much back to normal. He\u2019s an inspiration.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Kemeter, the successful transplant provides a chance to get back what he lost in the past few years \u2014 traveling, the occasional concert, exercising, even just keeping up his home.<\/p>\n

But he also sees his new lease on life as an opportunity to help others.<\/p>\n

\u201cGod\u2019s got a purpose for me. I don\u2019t know what it is, but I know that I have a lot of gratitude. I feel that and I want to be able to give back,\u201d he said. \u201cThat family of the donor, every Christmas they\u2019re going to remember that they lost a loved one and I\u2019ve got this gift. It\u2019s always been called the gift of life. I don\u2019t want to waste it. My main goal is to do what I can to help others.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\"UTMC<\/a>

Mark Kemeter, who was born with a rare congenital defect, received a lifesaving kidney transplant at The University of Toledo Medical Center last Christmas. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":876,"featured_media":79431,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1,7,63],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79429"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/876"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=79429"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79429\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":79437,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/79429\/revisions\/79437"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/79431"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=79429"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=79429"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.utoledo.edu\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=79429"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}