'Live organ donors can save lives' says Fife woman with kidney failure

One Fife woman is trying to raise awareness of how live organ donors are vital to people.

Louise Smith shared her friends Kerry Brown's story to mark World Kidney Day on March 14 and in the hope of finding her a donor. 

Kerry, from Dunfermline, was diagnosed with kidney failure in the early 2022, just four years after losing her husband to brain cancer. 

The 38-year-old mum of three is on dialysis three times a week. It's one of the only treatment options available to her.

She says receiving a kidney transplant would change her life.

She added: "There's so many things I can't do with the children so I feel a lot of guilt.

"But a new kidney from a live donor would mean the world." 

She's urging people to check any symptoms and says she may have gone to hospital sooner if she knew more about the disease.

She adds: "Some of the first symptoms I felt I just felt really fatigued.

"I remember trying to walk up the stairs at work. I got to the top and was really exhausted, that wasn't like me at all.

"I had got a sort of tremor in my hands, a sweet taste in my mouth."

Louise added: "Kerry and her family's lives have been flipped upside down due to her kidneys failing. Her kids are desperate to get their mum back.

"Dialysis three times a week for five hours at a time, the very thing keeping her alive, is having terrible effects on her body and means Kerry can’t take her children on holiday, do activities that she’d like to with them or take her little boy to school every morning.

"Although some of Kerry’s family have been tested to see if they can donate a kidney to her, none of them are a match.

"A transplant would mean that Kerry could live a longer, healthier and more 'normal' life.

"6 people in the UK die every week waiting on an organ transplant? We need to find Kerry a live donor."