By Jamie Strickland
Johnston County resident Gray Sasser has been in need of a kidney transplant since 2017.
As an active member of the community, his church and family life, after a long career as a lighting engineer, he hopes to be able to enjoy retirement for many more years to come.
“Fortunately, I have not had to begin dialysis, but that does not appear to be very far away,” he said.
Johnston Now Magazine did a feature on Sasser in January 2024, where we told the story of how he lost one of his kidneys due to a mass that resulted in its surgical removal. He was left with one good kidney, and despite being in great health and an initially positive prognosis, that kidney slowly started to fail. He is now in need of a living donor.
“Since then, I have had two gentlemen make an effort to donate a kidney, both were turned down for medical reasons,” Sasser said. “This year I managed to get registered with the National Kidney Registry. With their program, anyone can donate a kidney anywhere in the country in my name, and I get moved up on the transplant list here.”
Through the organization’s Paired Donation program, donors don’t even have to be the same blood type as the person they know who is in need. They can donate a kidney that will go to another person in need who is a match, and another donor’s kidney will go to their loved one.
Sasser is registered at both UNC Chapel Hill and Virginia Commonwealth University Health in Richmond, VA.
“Chapel Hill tells me it could be another 3-4 years before a cadaver kidney could be available,” he said. “I’m just waiting and trusting in God that He’ll come through for me, even if it’s at the last minute.”To find out more about the National Kidney Registry and how the program works, visit nkr.org. To see more information about Sasser, you can visit his profile page on the site here: https://www.nkr.org/BGS379/Card.
