Nearly eight months after suffering a seizure caused by undetected kidney failure, 13-year-old Deziree Del Toro and her family received the call of a lifetime.
On Dec. 27, while at Valley Children’s Hospital to address a catheter issue related to her dialysis treatment, the Turlock Christian middle schooler, better known as “Dezi,” learned that she had a transplant match and that she’d be heading into surgery in the coming days at Stanford Medical Center, where she had been receiving all of her treatment. Roughly 48 hours later, the kidney transplant surgery was a success, and she has been recovering at the hospital since. Her doctors are optimistic that she can return home soon.
“Praise God,” said her mother, Dulce Del Toro, who works in the Turlock Christian front office as a human resources specialist. “She is doing very well… Our girl is definitely a fighter. It's been quite a journey, but she's doing amazing.”
Over the course of the following week, though there was some discomfort and loss of appetite during the first two days of recovery, Del Toro had no bad reactions to any of the required medication and the new kidney’s function remained stable.
In recent weeks, the energetic seventh grader has been on her feet, taking walks around the campus with her family and playing games in her room.
Finding the donor was especially relieving after having felt disappointment just three weeks earlier. On Dec. 3, the family received a call from Stanford about a potential donor with type-O blood, but learned a few hours later that the kidney wouldn’t be compatible for other reasons.
While the family continued to wait, doctors discovered that the cause of Del Toro’s kidney failure was a genetic mutation, which is when mutations in the PKD1 or PKD2 genes cause abnormal cysts to form in the kidneys and damage the organ. Prior to being placed on the transplant list, Stanford doctors had to ensure that the mutations were not associated with any tumors, as they sometimes are. Once scans came back clear, she was back on the list by mid-November.
The identity of Del Toro’s kidney donor is not yet known.
During the recovery process, she also confided in classmate Jaxon Shaneyfelt, a fellow Turlock Christian Eagle who received a successful transplant just over a year ago. Shaneyfelt occasionally returns to Stanford for regular checkups. On Jan. 15, the two youngsters were coincidentally getting follow-up procedures at the neighboring Lucile Packard Foundation, and posed with each other for a photo.
As each continues their post-transplant journeys, they each hope that research continues to help others in need of organ transplants in the future. In fact, the 15-year-old Shaneyfelt, whose transplant was needed after being diagnosed with juvenile nephronophthisis, has been asked to participate in two research studies for Stanford Medical. He recently donated kidney tissues from a biopsy for research on rare genetic and end-stage kidney failures, as well as to help doctors develop new ways to grow human kidneys.
“(We’re) praying that it helps someone in some way in the future,” his mother, Micah said.
There are currently about 92,000 Americans on the kidney transplant waiting list. In 2023, just 27,332 were able to get a kidney transplant — 6,290 from living donors, according to the American Kidney Fund.
