How buying a sandwich helped save Bharat’s life
WHILE working in Scotland, Bharat Patel popped into a corner shop to buy a sandwich – and it was there he first saw Avril.
Little did he know the person he met while buying his lunch would go on to save his life.
Avril and Bharat stayed in touch after that chance meeting and became great friends.
In 2001, Bharat, who is originally from Leicester, was diagnosed with kidney failure and was placed on the donor list. Between then and 2008 he continued to meet up with Avril and a romance blossomed.
But when Bharat’s kidneys began to function at just 5 per cent, he was told to get ready for dialysis as no donor match had come forward.
He said: “My life was not worth living. I couldn’t walk, I couldn’t sleep, I was clinically depressed and had to be on 30 tablets a day. I used to tell the doctors they were keeping me alive for the sake of it.”
Avril, by this time his girlfriend, stepped in and asked to be tested to see if she was a donor match. Avril said: “My boyfriend was suffering so much. I knew Bharat and I were the same blood type so I decided to get tested.”
But Bharat, now 64, said: “I knew that because I am Hindu I would most likely get an organ donation from someone else Hindu. So I just disregarded the idea. When I was told we were a match I was shocked.”
Avril, 51, added: “I had never had an operation before but I knew 100 per cent I wanted to do it.”
Before the operations took place Bharat tried to make his relationship with Avril formal.
He said: “Some people told Avril I was only with her to get the kidney and I’d be off once I got it, so I tried to arrange a wedding in hospital before we had the operations but it wasn’t possible.”
On October 29, 2008 at the General hospital in Leicester, Avril donated a kidney to her boyfriend.
Bharat said: “My life basically changed overnight.”
Avril said: “I was completely fine after the operation and still am so it was definitely worth it.”
She became Mrs Patel a year after the operations and the couple are now celebrating the tenth anniversary of the kidney donation and have an important message to share.
Bharat said: “Transplants work. Ten years on my donated kidney is working absolutely fine and functions the same as when it was first transplanted.”
Avril said: “Everybody has two kidneys and you only need one to function – the other is spare.
Since 2008, Avril and Bharat have been volunteering as renal support workers at Leicester hospitals, as well as working with the trust’s Kidney Care Appeal and appearing at major events involving black, Asian and minority ethnic (Bame) communities.
According to Bharat, Bame communities make up a quarter of the UK population yet only 1 per cent are on the organ donation register.
“To the best of my knowledge there are no religious beliefs against organ donation and I am proof that it does work.
“I’m not asking people to be a live donor but just to be on the register as it could be them in my position one day.”