Organ recipient learns value of donors By GENE KEMMETER of The Gazette Cheryl Rushevics knows the value of organ donations. She's living proof the organ donor program works, and she wants others to become aware of it. She's part of a group working to benefit organ transplant recipients with a golf event that will be held at 12:30 p.m. Saturday, June 16, at the Wisconsin River Country Club. The event, called the "Hail Mary Open," is an 18-hole scramble golf fund-raiser. The first-time event is being held in memory of Mary Yaeger and Michael Peterson; and in honor of Dale "Doc" Brown and Rushevics, all local residents who were recipients of organ transplants. A little more than a year ago, Rushevics knew little about organ donations. Then her whole life changed dramatically, although she remembers little about it. Her memory was impacted by the turn of events. On Oct. 1, 2000, Rushevics received a liver transplant, something she never expected she would ever need. She started getting jaundice on March 31, 2000, she said, and her skin and eyes were turning yellow. She relies on her husband, Maris Rushevics, to fill in the missing pieces of the last year because she can't remember the events because of the situation and the medication she was on. Doctors have told her it may be a year before her memory improves, she said. Maris said they went to see Dr. Carol Rave at Rice Medical Center about her condition on April 3, 2000, and the doctor put Cheryl in St. Michael's Hospital. Dr. David Polomis began treating her and on April 13, 2000, Cheryl was transferred to University Hospitals in Madison by ambulance because of acute liver failure. Cheryl remained in Madison until June 16, 2000, when she was discharged because her condition was improving. "She had a 10 to 20 percent chance to live in April, but she got better," Maris said. Back in Stevens Point, Cheryl went to St. Michael's Hospital on a weekly basis for blood transfusions, but then things started taking a turn for the worse, Maris said, and Cheryl was hospitalized at St. Michael's again on Sept. 13, then transferred back to Madison on Sept. 26. On Sept. 27, Cheryl was placed on the list of potential transplant patients, he said, and because of her condition, age and the seriousness of her illness, she went to the top of the list. On Saturday, Sept. 30, Maris was in Madison with Cheryl and he said the doctors told him Cheryl's condition was worsening and he took a break from the two-hour-visit limits to check on the Wisconsin-Michigan football game. When he returned to his motel, he said, there was a message that a donor liver may be available. At 6 p.m. that day, a hospital helicopter with an organ procurement team took off because of a traffic accident involving a young man, and the family was donating his organs, he said. The helicopter returned about 10 p.m., he said, and Cheryl went into the operating room about 3 a.m. and was out about 10:30 a.m. "That's seven-and-a-half hours of surgery," he said. "The amazing thing about it," he added, "is that they did five transplant operations from the same person." Cheryl received the liver, another person got the heart and a lung, another a lung, one a kidney and the fifth a pancreas and kidney. "That doesn't include others whose lives were saved with other tissues," he said. After the transplant, Cheryl remained in the hospital until Oct. 26, then went to River Pines Center in Whiting for rehabilitation because she had been in hospital beds for so long. She left River Pines on Dec. 16. Cheryl said doctors are uncertain what caused the sudden onset of liver failure, and that efforts to avoid a transplant didn't help. "I didn't have a choice but to have a transplant," she said, adding that she was lucky to get a donor liver in only four days. "The last thing I remember is someone telling me to count backwards from 10," she said about the operation. She's taking medication and anti-rejection drugs and expects to take them the rest of her life, she said. "I'm taking pills, exercising and taking lots of water." She went back to Madison for a checkup on May 2 and doesn't have to go back until October, although she goes to St. Michael's Hospital every two weeks for blood tests, with the results faxed to Madison for review. Maris said a doctor who performed the transplant surgery said the first day he saw Cheryl he never thought she would come out of the hospital. "Something like that changes your whole outlook on life." Cheryl is amazed by the volunteers who are working on the fund-raiser. "It's a community affair," she said. People need to tell their family to donate every organ they can," she said. "You never know when you're going to need it." Maris said the fund-raiser is to raise community awareness. "It costs you nothing," he said about organ donations. "The sacrifice is priceless." To show the need for donor organs, Maris said when Cheryl received her transplant, another family in Grand Rapids, Mich., had also been notified of potential donor organ and came to Madison in case a match was possible. "They had to go home," he said. "That's the real tragedy." The golf event is being sponsored by a local "Friends and Family Supporting the Gift of Life" group. Sue Hansen, chairperson, said the group's focus is to help educate, raise money, and to secure more local organ donors. All proceeds will be given to the University of Wisconsin Foundation Donor Awareness Fund and the American Diabetes Association. Cost of the 18-hole golf event, and a picnic dinner following to be held at Archie's Bar & Grill, 2317 Division St., is $50 per person. Golf carts are limited and are being offered for an additional $10.50. Non-golfers who would like to participate are encouraged to attend the 5:30 p.m. picnic dinner. In addition to food, beverages, music and door prizes will be provided. The cost is $20 per person. To register or to obtain more information, contact Hansen at Archie's, 344-9895. Organ donors need to state desire to donate Organ donation is basically a two-step process. People who want to donate organs should: 1. Sign the back of your driver's license, confirming your wish to donate organs. 2. Discuss your intentions with family members, so that at death, next of kin can give consent to your donation. The second step is important, because family members must give consent at the time of an organ donor's death. * There are no additional hospital charges to a donor's family or estate for costs related to the donation. * Donors can still have an open casket funeral. For further information on organ and tissue donation, contact (608) 263-1341 between 9 a.m. and 5 p.m. Resources are also available at St. Michael's Hospital in Stevens Point through the emergency department at 346-5100 or spiritual services at 346-5362.