For nearly 30 years, Donna M. struggled to breathe. Decades of damage had taken a toll on her lungs.
“I first got sick in 1992,” she says. “That was the beginning of my bad lung journey.”
Donna was diagnosed with tuberculosis (TB) that year. Treatment cured the infection, but her lung function never fully recovered.
“I lost a little over 50% of my lung capacity from TB,” she says.
In the years that followed, Donna developed asthma and COPD. She also had frequent bouts of bronchitis and was hospitalized more than once because of pneumonia.
Then she developed a Mycobacterium avium complex (MAC) infection that further compromised her breathing. MAC infections are caused by bacteria that are found in dust, soil, or water. For most people, those bacteria are harmless. But Donna’s medical problems left her vulnerable.
“That infection started to deteriorate the rest of my lungs,” Donna says.
By 2020, Donna needed supplemental oxygen. Struggling to breathe and coughing constantly, she spent most of her time inside her Delaware home.
“Some days I didn’t get off the couch,” Donna says. “I would tell my friends, ‘I’m not circling the drain, but I’m heading toward it.’ I could feel it in my bones that there was no coming back from this. I was done fighting for breath.”
But Donna’s fight wasn’t over.
Making the transplant list
In the spring of 2021, Donna’s pulmonologist recommended she see Gerard J. Criner, MD, FACP, FACCP, Director of the Temple Lung Center. Donna learned she might be a candidate for a double lung transplant — and she began to find hope again.
Donna’s experienced care team walked her through each step of the transplant evaluation process. They tested her physical and psychological health, including heart tests and CT scans.
About two months later, Donna was at her Delaware home when the phone rang. She had made the lung transplant waiting list.
“I remember going into the kitchen, and all of a sudden I was so overwhelmed,” Donna says. “I just busted out crying — a heavy, heavy crying. And I held onto the sink. And this was the weirdest feeling in the world. It felt like there were dozens of arms around me, holding me so that I wouldn’t fall. I could almost feel my mother and my grandparents, my aunt, and everyone I loved who is not here anymore. I controlled my crying and went back into the family room and said, ‘It’s going to be OK.’”
Donna remained on the transplant list for about a year. Then, in August 2022, she and her husband were having dinner at home when Donna received another call from Temple. A pair of donor lungs were available, and she needed to be at Temple that evening by 7 p.m.
“I was kind of in shock,” she says. “I said to my husband, ‘We’ve got to go.’”
‘I wake up every morning and it’s wonderful'
Donna and her husband drove two hours to Temple, where she underwent a 12-hour double lung transplant surgery performed by the world-renowned Temple lung transplant team. Her surgery was a great success.
