Looks like the unstoppable Kelly Perkins has recently made another ascent in Yosemite, with the help of Yosemite Mountaineering School guide, Scott Stowe. Since getting a heart transplant in 1995, Kelly has been traveling the world, climbing significant peaks in an effort to promote organ donation. She’s a great inspiration, not only for organ transplant recipients, but for all of us because of her intense resolve to continue to do activities that she loves with no excuses. Here’s an excerpt from the AP story in the NY Times.
YOSEMITE NATIONAL PARK, Calif. (AP) — A heart transplant survivor has added another first to her long string of mountaineering feats since getting a new heart 13 years ago — a dangerous 2 1/2-day climb up the sheer, 2,000-foot face of Half Dome, Yosemite National Park’s famed granite monolith.
Kelly Perkins, 46, and her husband, Craig, led by big-wall guide Scott Stowe, began the climb Thursday and reached the top of the iconic 8,842-foot-high dome Saturday afternoon.
The ascent completed an important circle for her. In 1996, 10 months out of the hospital with her new heart, she finished the first of many post-transplant climbs by hiking up the easier backside of Half Dome.
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2 responses to “Heart Transplant Recipient Scales Half Dome”
Your story about Kelly Perkins highlighted the tragic shortage of human organs for transplant operations.
Over half of the 99,000 Americans on the national transplant waiting list will die before they get a transplant. Most of these deaths are needless. Americans bury or cremate about 20,000 transplantable organs every year. Over 6,000 of our neighbors suffer and die needlessly every year as a result.
There is a simple way to put a big dent in the organ shortage — give organs first to people who have agreed to donate their own organs when they die.
Giving organs first to organ donors will convince more people to register as organ donors. It will also make the organ allocation system fairer. People who aren’t willing to share the gift of life should go to the back of the waiting list as long as there is a shortage of organs.
Anyone who wants to donate their organs to others who have agreed to donate theirs can join LifeSharers. LifeSharers is a non-profit network of organ donors who agree to offer their organs first to other organ donors when they die. Membership is free at http://www.lifesharers.org or by calling 1-888-ORGAN88. There is no age limit, parents can enroll their minor children, and no one is excluded due to any pre-existing medical condition.
[…] Note: You may remember about a week ago we posted an article about the unstoppable Kelly Perkins who, with the help of husband Craig and Scott Stowe of the Yosemite Mountaineering School climbed […]