BBC Radio 4, 26 July 2012, 21.00-21.45, also available via the iPlayer or as a podcast
From the programme’s website:
Since losing her husband to a terminal illness, and watching his kidneys fail, Pamela has felt a burning desire to try to help someone else escape a similar fate.
A year after his death, she writes to her local hospital to ask if she can become an ‘altruistic’ donor, and donate one of her kidneys to a stranger. To her horror, she receives a letter back saying that she is ‘too old’. Undeterred, she approaches a transplant surgeon at another hospital, and he agrees to see her.
To the surgeon, Pamela appears fit and extremely determined. But for a potential donor, she’s also rather unusual – she’s eighty two years old.
Should Pamela be allowed to donate? What are the risks to her – both of the operation itself, and of being left with only one kidney? And, if the team allow her to donate, who should receive such an elderly organ?
