The principle of kidney transplants in Patras and more widely in our region, it took place in 1997, led by the professor and then director of the Nephrology Center of the University Hospital of Patras, Ioannis Vlachogiannis.
The first patient who was transplanted was a 26-year-old Patrino man and his father was a donor. Today the recipient, who is Konstantinos Katsanos, is 52 years old and his father George is 81 years old. Both are healthy and continue on with their lives.
“I am diabetic. As you know, this silent disease eats away at our body without us realizing it. At some point my kidneys failed. On the 16th of January 1996 I started the peritoneal dialysis and since then it has been a horrible adventure. Until the issue of the transplant was raised and it was found that my father was compatible,” Mr. Katsanos describes and adds:
“I was lucky, because I had met Theodoros Karatzas, a surgeon, who was well-known and worked alongside the distinguished surgeon Andreas Tzakis. I entered the University Hospital of Patras because I was also sick with the flu on May 16, 1997. Mr. Tzakis was in Thessaloniki for a conference. May 23rd arrived and as planned the transplant took place. Everything went very well. My father gave me a second life and everything has been going well since then. We are both healthy…”.
The people who lived my health adventure with me are now my people. I will of course never forget Mr. Karatza, who was the key factor in this whole adventure of mine. Mr. Tzakis, the then director of the Ioannis Vlachogiannis Nephrology Clinic, to whom I owe a lot. The current director of the Clinic, professor Dimitrios Goumone, who at that time had come to the University Hospital and never stopped taking care of me. The current deputy professor Evangelos Papachristou, who was then a specialist. I remember how much he took care of me and even sometimes I didn’t treat him well, because I was in pain and this weighs on me to this day…”.
Kostas Katsanos, through the description of his own adventure, wants to spread the message of organ donation. “I earned my life and am enjoying it today thanks to the transplant. Organ donation is a source of life and is the only way for some people to continue to breathe, to live.”
PRICE EVENT TODAY
Since this first transplant, the Kidney Transplant Unit of the University Hospital of Patras completed 300 transplants this year. This is the reason why today, on the eve of tomorrow’s World Kidney Day, the Nephrology Center and the Transplantation Unit are organizing a meeting at 12 noon in the auditorium of the University Hospital of Patras.
Dimitris Goumons
DIMITRIS GOUMENOS
“The 300 transplants are a particularly important achievement for the treatment of patients in Western Greece. Our results from these 300 transplants are on a par with the big Transplant Centers abroad” notes the professor of Pathology-Nephrology, director of the Nephrology and Transplant Center of PGNP Dimitrios Goumenos, who fought to keep the Transplant Center of PGNP alive. Mr. Vlachogiannis will be present, as will the emeritus professor of surgery Dionysios Karavias who also played a key role in the transplants.
Dionysios Karavias
EXCELLENT TEAM
He adds that “these results are due to the many years of experience and the excellent cooperation between nephrologists, surgeons, anesthesiologists and nurses of the Nephrology Center and the operating rooms. The perspective is excellent, as we have already proceeded with more and more difficult kidney transplants from living donors, as we are fortunate to have a specialized surgeon, Mr. Karydis, and at the same time we have developed a substantial collaboration with the Kidney Transplantation Unit of the University Hospital of Ioannina and its director Professor Michael Mitsis. The transplant program is to be expanded to include pancreas transplants. Feeling the burden of responsibility for the patients of Western Greece, we are organizing this event together with the Hellenic Nephrology Society, with the aim of providing the widest and most detailed information possible.”
Nikolaos Karydis
Speakers at the event, in addition to Messrs. Goumone, Karydis and Mitsis, will be the professor and director of the Surgical Clinic of PGNP Ioannis Maroulis, the head of the Department. A’ of the National Organization of Transplantation Monitoring and Coordination of the Transplantation Process Ioulis Menoudakou, the curator of Nephrology of the PGNP Theodoros Drinias, the associate professor of nephrology Marios Papasotiriou and Dr. professor of nephrology of the PGNP Evangelos Papachristou.
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