New Jersey Woman Finally Gets Kidney Transplant After Craigslist Donor Fell Through
EGG HARBOR, N.J. (CBSNewYork) -- A New Jersey woman used a Craigslist advertisement to find a kidney donor, but when that donation fell through, she ended up with a kidney that came from halfway around the world.
When CBS2 first met Nina Saria in 2015, she was getting ready for surgery. A man named Glenn Calderbank, from Berlin, New Jersey, had stumbled across her husband's Craigslist post seeking a "brave person" to donate a kidney.
Calderbank had reason to be brave -- he'd lost his wife after a failed kidney transplant five years ago. He told Saria their match was meant to be, CBS2's Dr. Max Gomez reported.
"I said, 'look, I know I'm a match.' She said, 'how do you know that?' And I said, 'there is no way that I saw your ad by accident, we're the same blood type, and I'm not a match,'" he said in a 2015 interview.
Saria said she was looking forward to coming off dialysis and spending more time with her son.
"It's a dream, and it's not real," she said in 2015.
Sadly, she was right, and that dream wouldn't become a reality. After surgery began, doctors discovered that Calderbank had a chronic liver disease.
"One of the surgeons woke me up and said, 'Nina, you're going to wake up.' I said, 'did I get a kidney already?'" Saria recalled. "So he said, 'no, I'm sorry, but the donor had a problem.'"
Saria had found another match -- her mother, but there was a problem there too. Her mother lived half a world away in the country of Georgia. U.S. authorities had rejected the family's visa request on multiple occasions.
"When mother goes in and says, 'I'm going to go there, and donate a kidney and save my daughter,' and you tell her, 'I know it's an emergency, but I'm sorry I cannot let you go,' you know, what can you say?" she said.
Then, U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez (D, New Jersey) got involved.
Menendez helped the family quality for "humanitarian parole," a step federal immigration officials describe as "an extraordinary measure," allowing foreigners to enter the United States "for a temporary period... due to a compelling emergency."
One year to the day after her original transplant fell through, Saria was back in the hospital. This time, she walked in with her mother and walked out with a new kidney.
"That was a day when I looked up and I said, 'thank God,'" she said.
Saria said her new kidney has improved her health so much she feels like a new person. As for Calderbank, his selfless offer man have saved his life, since he didn't know about his liver disease until he tried to donate.
