Local woman needs kidney

MOSES LAKE - Moses Lake resident Megan Dunnagan has a few things she would like to cross off her "bucket list" over the next few years.

Nothing extravagant, she said, just plans to train as a children's dialysis technician, become a foster mom and volunteer within her community - plans medical struggles have forced the 28-year-old to put on hold.

Dunnagan has been on dialysis for about 12 years. She currently spends three to four hours a day, five days a week doing in-home hemodialysis care.

Dunnagan said she is in desperate need of a new kidney. She and her family have been working to get her story out to various Eastern Washington communities in hopes of finding a donor.

They've placed ads in several newspapers and recently started a Facebook page, she said.

"They really want me to get this kidney so I can be free from dialysis, so I can live a normal life," Dunnagan said. "I want to live a normal life."

Her kidney problems began at birth.

"It was an asphyxiated birth, the umbilical cord was wrapped around my neck twice, and it took both my kidneys," she said. As a result, she had to be flown from Alaska to the Seattle Children's Hospital where she was placed on dialysis.

Dunnagan said she received a kidney from her mother, Janet Dunnagan, when she was 2. That kidney lasted for 14 years, she said.

"Now I'm just waiting for the second kidney, I'm waiting for someone to be a match," she said. "We've had some people test but nobody has matched."

Dunnagan said she needs a donor with type O blood. However, she said she's considered "highly sensitized," which means only a small percentage of potential donors will be a match.

"I've had so many blood transfusions throughout my life and the first transplant from my mom that now I have a lot of antibodies," she said.

Dunnagan said many family members have already been tested, including her older brother and sister, but they weren't a match.

She is currently at the top of a waiting list at Spokane's Sacred Heart Medical Center, she said.

"I'm at the top of the list because I've been on it since before my 18th birthday," she said. "I'm also listed nationally."

Dunnagan said she hopes sharing her story will not only lead to finding a kidney, but that it will lead to more people becoming organ donors in general.

"There are so many people waiting for other organs, not just kidneys," she said.

She said she's met people waiting for hearts, livers and lungs over the years.

"There's more people on the list then there are organ donors and each year people die while waiting for an organ because they don't get there in time," Dunnagan said.

She said she knows how tough it can be to wait for news that a donor has been found.

"It's sad just trying to wait," she said. "I've been on (a waiting list) for 12 years and sometimes I think - will a kidney ever come?"

Dunnagan said she encourages people to become donors so other patients might have a chance to remove their names from a waiting list.

For more information, or to connect with Dunnagan, visit www.facebook.com/kidneyprayersformegan.

Potential donors can also call Sacred Heart directly at 509-474-3131 and ask for the kidney transplant team.