TRANSPLANT NEWS

A k r o n - C a n t o n Tr a n s p l a n t R e c i p i e n t s
May email:transplant@neo.rr.com

May Meeting
REMAINING SCHEDULE:
Our meeting will be May 18th at
North Canton Medical Foundation JUNE 15TH
Education Building A OPEN HOUSE
6046 Whipple Ave. N.W.
North Canton JUNE 19TH & 21ST
6:30p.m. - 8:30 p.m. HARTVILLE FLEA MARKET

Meeting will commence at 6:30 JULY 20TH

with a meal followed by any GUEST SPEAKER, PHARMICIST
announcements and/or
pertinent information. AUGUST 8TH
CELEBRATION OF LIFE PICNIC
FILM: John Torok Community Senior Center
TOTAL ARTIFICIAL HEART 4224 Massillon Road, Green, Ohio
12:00noon - 4:00p.m.
AFTER FILM:
SUSAN & RAY GOLDEN WILL AUGUST 17TH
TO BE ANNOUNCED
TELL US ABOUT THEIR TRIP
TO CHINA
SEPTEMBER 21ST
LIFEBANC SPEAKER
Meeting will close with a
round table discussion.
OCTOBER 19TH
OCTOBERFEST
We hope you will attend if at
all possible.
NOVEMBER 16TH
FILM: FUTURE DIRECTIONS IN
Special thanks to President ORGAN TRANSPLANTATION
Dick Becherer for making up
the schedule. DECEMBER 21ST
CELEBRATION OF LIFE HOLIDAY PARTY

1
 t r a n
FILM: THE POWER OF TWO
SATURDAY, MAY 15, 2010
Uncorked Wine Bar
22 North High Street
Akron, Ohio
Thanks to the folks at Temple
Israel routing Dan Roth’s
inquiry about Akron-Canton
TRIO and the recent organ
donation service, he contacted
Micki Wise. TRIO is actually
an official Community Partner
of the film project they are
working on, and J. T. Rhodes
is a member of their advisory
board.
Mr. Roth invited TRIO
members to join them as they
continue to do outreach and
raise support for the film’s
final stages of shooting and
production. The project is
spearheaded by Award-
nominated producer/director
Marc Smolowitz (“The Weather
Underground,” “Trembling
Before G-d” with a planned
release of early 2011.
s p l a n t n e w s
The trailer for the film, just re-
leased last week, is available
here:
http://www.thepoweroftwo
movie.com/2010/04/29/the-
power-of-two-trailer/
The final film shoots will take
place at the Donate Life
Hollywood Film Festival in
Los Angeles, the U.S.
Transplant Games in Madison,
Wisconsin, and a 5-day
advocacy trip to Washington,
D.C.
TRIO Members attending were
Susan & RayGolden,
Jacqui & Rick Scolaro,
Micki Wise and Mary Fread.
Approximately 40 people
attended the event and Akron-
Canton brochures were
available for anyone interested.
There was an open discussion
following the film. Ray Golden
convinced one young minority
gentleman to let his family
and friends know about his
decision to be a donor and
encourage others.
 t r a n
On Sunday afternoon, a private
event was held at the home of
Susan and John Golden in
Fairlawn Heights. Susan was
surprised to meet our own
beautiful lung recipient, Susan
Golden and her husband, Ray.
Micki Wise also attended to
inform everyone of her wish
to have “Presumed Consent”
in the U.S. She feels that is
her purpose in life and has been
an advocate for Presumed
Consent for over ten years.
I do wish her success.
“Stenzel Twins Bring Personal
Report to San Francisco Bay
Chapter” appeared in the
January 2010 Lifelines which
was a very interesting report
by Steve Okonek, President,
San Francisco Bay Chapter.
If you missed the article and
would like a copy, please let me
know.
s p l a n t n e w s
Portions of Rabbi
Feinburg’s Serman
on Organ Donation
April 16, 2010:
Judaism helps us to prioritize
claims by giving us several
paramount ideas. the first and
foremost is called “PIKUACH
NEFESH,” which means “saving
a life.” there is no greater
Mitzvah. Saving a life takes
precedence over every other
commandment. You are aware
that our tradition places a great
deal of importance on burying
people whole and not
desecrating the body after
death. But the Rabbinate of
all three movements--Reform,
Conservative, and Orthodox--
all of us agree that the need to
respect a dead body pales in
comparison to the requirement
of saving a life.The significance
of this precept is articulated in
the well known Talmudic saying
“one who saves a single life is
considered to have saved an
entire world.”
 t r a n s p
And yet, as much as we Jews
have always expressed our
commitment to life, our
tradition has never believed in
life-unending, or life sustained
on tubes, as was Theresa Ann
Campo’s. We Jews are a
people of hope. Our national
anthem,”HATIKVAH”, means
the “hope.” However, we must
not become prisoners of hope.
There comes a point when the
precept of saving a life has to
be balanced against the
awareness that the use of
extraordinary means does not
provide the kind of life God
wants us to live. Therefore, if
the organs of this all-but-
technically-dead child could
have saved other children,
Jewish ethics would have said
to proceed.
In addition to the concept of
saving a life, another age-old
Jewish precept bears directly
on oran transplant. It is called:
“BA’AL TASHCHIT” which
means that we must not waste
anything good that God has
made. The Torah says that we
cannot waste the earth’s
resources. And how much
the more so must you and I
not waste the organs that God
has made, organs that have
the potential to save the lives
of other human beings.
l a n t n e w s
Transplant medicine has made
phenomenal advancements
in the past twenty years. But
still, 100,000 people remain on
the national organ transplant
waiting list. And each day 19
people die waiting. Someday,
God-willing many years from
now, you and I can do
something to ameliorate this
problem. Through advanced
directives, living wills, and
donor self-identification cards,
we can make our wishes
known to our love ones and
physicians that we intend to
save a life with the organs God
gave us.
Let me again underscore the
fact that the three major
movements--Reform,
Conservative and Orthodox--
agree on this issue. In fact,
this is one of the few areas in
which our scholars have
consensus. So you can under-
stand how it troubles me to
hear that some members of
our community continue to
base their end-of-life decisions
on fear and superstition.
I also know that some Jews
believe in the resurrection of
the body at the end of time,
but they need to be reminded
that Orthodox scholars do not
take this theme in a literal
sense.
 t r a n s p
In fact, the man who is
perhaps the leading Jewish
Medical Ethicist of our time,
Orthodox Rabbi Moshe Tendler,
has said: “for Jews, organ
donation is not an option; it
is virtually a requirement.”
And, if you were to
contemplate the Rabbinic
teaching that saving a single
life is equivalent to saving the
entire world, perhaps you
might agree with Dr. Tendler.
In one of his final essays, the
great modern Jewish
philosopher, Abraham Joshua
Heschel wrote:”Our greatest
challenge is not how to
continue, but how to return.
How shall I repay unto the
Lord all of his bountiful deal-
ings with me, all the things
the Lord has loaned me? This
is the meaning of death: the
ultimate self-dedication to the
devine. The act of giving back
is reciprocity on our part for
God’s gift of life.”
Dr. Heschel wrote these words
when transplants were just
beginning. But these words are
truer today than when he
wrote them.
l a n t n e w s
Today we have the capacity to
pay back the loan of our lives
by giving life to another
person, something that no
previous generation in history
could even dream of.
If life is understood in this way
as something we are given on
loan, then death can be under-
stood as a giving back, as our
way of thanking God for all we
have been loaned. Giving a
heart, a lung, a liver, a kidney,
a pancreas can be understood
as extending the loan, as
sharing the life, as passing on
the blessing we have been
given. From ancient times,
human beings have dreamed of
immortality. We might be able
to live forever in a physical
sense. But, organ donation
enables us to live beyond our
our lifetimes in a spiritual and
ethical sense.
May our lives, while we are
alive, and may our bodies, after
we are gone, be gifts to the
world, and gifts we give back
to the One who gave us the gift
of life.
KEYN YEHI RATZON..So may it
be God’s will and ours.
AMEN
Lawmaker offers plan to boost
organ donation
(Akron Beacon Journal 4/28/10-
submitted by Micki Wise)
New York assemblyman wants
laws that presume people want
to donate
by Michael Gormley, Associated Press
Albany,N.Y.: A New York
assemblyman whose daughter
is alive because of two kidney
transplants wants his state to
become the first in the nation
to pass laws that would
presume people want to
donate their organs unless
they specifically say otherwise.
Assemblyman Richard Brodsky
believes the “presumed
consent” measures would help
combat a rising demand for
healthy organs by patients
forced to wait a year or more
for transplants. Twenty-four
European countries already
have such laws in place, he said
If he succeeds, distraught
families would no longer be
able to override their loved
ones’ decisions to donate upon
their death. and eventually,
hospitals would be able to
assume the deceased consented
to have his or her organs
harvested, unless the person
refused in writing.
Brodsky’s interest in organ
donation is personal; his 18-
year-old daughter,
Julianne “Willie” Brodsky,
received a kidney four years
ago from a donor who was
struck by lightning and an
earlier transplant from her
mother.
“People’s survival should not
rest on acts of God alone.”
said the elder Brodsky, a
Westchester County Democrat.
Advocates say the availability
of healthy donor organs is low
just about everywhere nation-
wide, where 106,000 people
are on a waiting list that
averages three to four years for
each type of organ.
Supporters of presumed
consent say more than a dozen
people on the national waiting
list die each day.
but serious emotional, medical
and ethical concerns worry
families, who currently can
stop organ harvests even if
their loved ones agree to
donate. So New York will move
slowly, Brodsky said.
Presumed consent, opponents
say, could force someone to
become a donor against their
will.
It might also lead patients
viewed as prospective donors to
worry about how hard a medical
team would work to save them
if there is a greater benefit to
harvesting the organs.
Arthur Caplan, director of the
Center for Bioethics at the
University of Pennsylvania,
said advances in medicine, a
proliferation of transplant
centers and longer life spans
are driving demand, while
supply is fairly static.
The following is a response
from Micki Wise which appeared
in the Akron Beacon Journal
5/10/2010
Presumed donors
I was extremely pleased to see
the article “Lawmaker offers
plan to boost organ donation.
Presumed consent for organ
donation only makes sense. This
does not negate choice. Anyone
who does not want to be an
organ donor will register to opt-
out and will be put on a do-not-
donate list. All others will be
presumed to be organ donors.
Not many people give this subject
much thought, but how quickly
things change when you or a loved
one is dying because not enough
organs are available. With pre-
sumed consent there may be
virtually no wait for a life-saving
organ.
“Don’t take your organs to
heaven. Heaven knows we
need them here.”
The following is a response to
a request to talk with a
Transplant Recipient:
Thanks for sending me to
Jacqui Scolaro! Her story is
incredible.
I wouldn’t mind at all telling you
about myself. I chose LifeBanc
as my pretend client for my
media relations and publicity
course at Kent State. I chose
LifeBanc because I agree with
what they believe in, and I think
it is important. I first found out
about LifeBanc from my friend
Krysten who interned there.
Throughout the semester I was
required to write pitch packages
about the organizations. I wrote
about its Gift of Life Walk & Run.
I wrote about issues many
individuals face when deciding
whether or not to become an
organ,eye and/or tissue donor.
And, I am working on a feature
story about donor recipients. I
wanted to talk to a recipient
because we were required to
write a feature story for our
organization. Also,I love talking
to people and hearing their story.
Everyone’s life is different and
interesting in its own way.
Thank you, Rachel Polchek
 I am also really looking forward to
NEWS FROM OUR MEMBERS:
CONNIE ARMOUR is continuing
therapy at Affinity Hospital in
Massillon. That is much better
than driving to Cleveland. Her
husband, John just passed all his
tests and is now a Real Estate
Agent. Congratulations and we
wish you both the very best.
RANDY FOGLE (Copy of his email)
“My kidney has slipped in function
a little. My creatinine has been
around 2.5. My transplant center
is not sure if chronic rejection is
going on or the kidney is just
aging, but don’t think acute
rejection is the problem. Of
course, I have been on antibotics
lately for a sinus infection and my
kidney function could be slow to
bounce back.
My current cast is yellow. I have
one more cast after that before
I get a waking cast. My foot
surgery was January 21st. The
orthopedist at Duke is happy with
my progress at healing.
I am considering getting stomach
stapling surgery this fall to finally
deal with my weight as dieting is
difficult and exercise impossible
right now.
I have relatives from Oklahoma
and California coming to visit in a
month or so. I am looking forward
to that.
a great summer, despite this being
tourist season!
All is well and send my regards to
TRIO.”
Note: Randy, we do miss you and
wish you well. We look forward to
seeing you as soon as possible.
Reminder from ROSIE PRICE:
“People may not remember exactly
what you did or what you said -
but they will always remember
how you made them feel.”
Note: Rosie has a magnetic
personality, is always helpful and
no matter what problems she may
have, is like a ray of sunshine and
can brighten up the life of anyone
she meets.
Jacqui & Rick Scolaro are in the
process of setting up their own
business in Canton as
“Heartfelt Transactions”.
We wish them great success.
PROMISED FOR JUNE NEWSLETTER:
A full report from Jacqui & Mary
about the Leadership Summit
in Philadelphia which was
awesome.
Newsletter Editor:
Mary Fread
1529 19th St NE
Canton, OH 44714-2105
Phone: 330-453-8214
email: freadm@neo.rr.com