DALLAS – A 20-year-old woman got a new kidney from her mother in a surgery that was streamed live on Facebook Friday morning at Methodist Dallas Medical Center.
Jessica Gutierrez, who was born with congenital abnormalities in her kidney function, was the recipient of a kidney from her mom, Maribel. Doctors say she’ll live longer with the healthy kidney.
“She never really felt well,” said transplant surgeon Richard Dickerman. “I think this is going to return her to what we all consider a normal way to interact with her family [...] and ultimately live longer than she would have on dialysis.”
The surgery was streamed live for thousands of total viewers in a series of Facebook Live videos during a span of a couple hours Friday morning.
Dr. Alejandro Mejia performed the first part of the surgery, using a robot to remove Maribel’s kidney. Dickerman then connected the kidney to Jessica.
Warning: Some images may not be for the faint of heart.
According to a comment posted on one of the live videos, Methodist Dallas transplant nephrologist Dr. Irfan Agha says 100,000 people are waiting for kidney transplants, and not all of them will survive long enough on dialysis to receive one.
“Transplant is the best form of therapy for kidney failure,” Dr. Agha says. “The best ticket out for these patients is to find a living donor."
Drs. Mejia and Dickerman hope the publicity around a live-streamed surgery will encourage more people to become living donors.
“I was surprised they wanted to do this type of thing live, but I was very much in favor of it because of the theme [...] that this would promote organ donation, especially living donation,” Dickerman said.
“We were hesitant,” Mejia added. “That’s the natural reaction to something as private as an operation going public. But when we thought about the possibility of educating people on the process [...] we thought it was a good opportunity.”
Before the transplant, Jessica Gutierrez commented from a pre-operation room, thanking the hundreds of people watching as her mom’s surgery got underway.
“Thank you so much! I'm super nervous but seeing my mom is making me happy!,” she wrote.
Mejia said the hospital has been using robotic transplant technology for four years and more than a dozen patients with great success.
