Kidneys failing, but not Nucci’s hope
Search for organ donor is ongoing
He still goes to the gym, although only once or twice a week now, instead of daily, as was his custom only a year ago. And each morning, he heads off to his job as vice president of external affairs at Suffolk University, where he just helped bring a 350-bed residence hall in Brighton to completion.
But for John Nucci, the clock is ticking.
Diagnosed at 33 with polycystic kidney disease, the same disease that killed his father, the former Boston city councilor was symptom-free for 32 years until last November, when fatigue set in and he and his family began a desperate search for a kidney donor.
Today, Nucci’s kidney function is only at 10 percent. But he remains hopeful that one day soon, a call will come, telling him that a matching donor has been found.
“Waiting is very difficult for anybody in this situation,” he said yesterday. “It’s a bad hand for anybody to be dealt. But for me, it’s important to stay busy and to stay positive. My work has been my life.”
After six years on the Boston School Committee in the 1980s — four as president — Nucci served as an at-large city councilor for four years, then ran unsuccessfully for mayor in 1993 against Thomas M. Menino. He spent the next 11 years as a Suffolk Superior Court clerk magistrate before going to work for Suffolk University 12 years ago.
So when word got out that he needed a kidney transplant and his three sons were ineligible to donate because they each have inherited the disease, scores of people he’d met during his long career in public service and complete strangers who’d read about his search in the Herald began to go to the website mghlivingdonors.org to be screened at Massachusetts General Hospital to determine if they were a match for Nucci or someone else in need of an organ transplant.
Last month, the Boston Police Department issued a public plea for potential kidney donors on its blog at the request of one of Nucci’s sons, officer Michael Nucci.
In all, more than 100 potential donors have volunteered to be screened. And Nucci’s three sons are training for a June 16 triathlon at Craigville Beach on the Cape, both to raise awareness about their father’s need for a transplant and to raise money for the Polycystic Kidney Disease Foundation to support research to eventually find a cure.
“Our goal was to raise just $2,000, and already we’ve raised more than double that,” said Nucci’s son John. “All of us have been blown away by the support. I think it’s raised his spirits just to see how many people out there do care.”
Nucci said he’s confident that a match still will be found for him. But even if one isn’t, he said, “the more potential donors step up, the better, because if they’re not a match for me, they may be for someone else.”