It's a multi-functional building that brings to us -- to the state of Nebraska and the people of the region a state-of-the-art research facility, a state-of-the-art cooperative care center...
As construction neared completion, Dr. Beyers Shaw and a group of former patients opened the $61 million Lied Transplant Center at the University of Nebraska Medical Center in Omaha.
2, 1, fall.
Beyond the brick, mortar, and technology is the philosophy of incorporating patients and their care partners into the medical team.
[Dr. Beyers Shaw Jr., Chair, UNMC Dept. of Surgery] "The basic idea is that you train a family member or a friend. The patient has to identify somebody that will be their cooperative care partner, and you really make them a part of the care team and you have them do some of the things that traditionally a nurse would do but maybe don't require the level of skills the nurses are actually trained to do."
Of the 12 floors within this building, four floors are dedicated to cancer and neuroscience research. But the heart of the Lied Center is the four floors of cooperative care suites.
These are the cooperative care rooms for the transplant patients. This is their sitting area here for the family. They have a television and VCR behind you.
[Dr. Shaw] "It's actually a very old concept. In fact, when people who have visited third world countries hear about what we're going to do, they say well, that's already the way they do it in third world countries. The big difference, of course, is that in third world countries they do it because they can't afford to do it otherwise and there aren't enough trained people to help provide the care and it's far from an ideal situation to have the family -- you know, operate on someone and give them back to the family and say here, good luck. In this situation, we obviously are going to take that many steps forward."
In February after a couple of months of additional housekeeping and a final inspection by anti-germ specialists, the center admitted patients.
[Donna Kavalier] "It kind of pulled a little bit but I just kept pulling and it all of a sudden -- you could feel it give and then I didn't have any problem.
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[Nurse] "Sometimes just grab another saline if that happens and try it again. If you still have trouble, let them know out there."
Donna Kavalier asks a lot of questions. She has to. Donna is the caregiver for her husband, Rich. He has non-Hodgkins lymphoma.
[Donna Kavalier] "They go through it step by step and if there's anything you don't feel comfortable doing, they say just tell us. That's what we're here for. If we need to do it, we'll do it. We do the morning blood drives so we can get the lab tests in earlier and that helps us that we don't have to go down to the treatment center quite so early if I can do that."
Two years ago Rich completed chemotherapy and thought everything was fine. Last fall he found two new growths. Since chemo wasn't taking care of the problem, the decision came down to a bone marrow transplant. The good news was he could be his own donor.
[Donna] "He -- they collected his stem cells himself. He was given what's called growth hormone injections to kind of stimulate your bone marrow to throw off these stem cells or to create more of them and then you go in and it's kind of like a phoresis type thing -- I don't know if you're familiar with that -- where they do platelets for cancer patients. It's about the same thing but they collect these stem cells instead and usually it takes anywhere, they say, from four to maybe 10 times and you do this every day and you still keep doing these growth hormone injections every day. He came in the first day and it takes about three and a half, four hours that he is hooked up to the machine. He collected in one day which they were really amazed. They have only seen that a couple of other times. This way he doesn't have to go through the donor post type rejection and they find that you have an easier time if you can be your own donor. "
After his treatment was completed, he was moved to the Lied to start the daily routine.
[Donna] "This is what we do four times a day. Do a blood pressure and a temp."
Donna by no means replaces the nurses. However, since she is always by her husband's side, she is the first to notice any changes in his condition. In one sense Rich was fortunate. His situation allowed him to be his own donor. For other cancer patients or those in need of a lifesaving organ, outside help, a donor of an organ or bone marrow, is needed.
[Kollen Thompson] "One of the ways we have chosen to do that is to plant a tree in communities like Lincoln that have large populations of people who have received a transplant and who have also been involved in the organ donation process."
Tree-planting ceremonies around Nebraska last year gave organ donation advocates a cause to celebrate. The medical professionals, the people who received lifesaving donations, and the people who take comfort knowing their lost loved one helped save another life shared their grief, their thanks, and their stories.
[Ceremony participant] "Our family was a donor family about 12 years ago when we lost our 7-year-old son to a car accident on South Street coming home from school. Little it be known that eight, nine years later I would receive a kidney transplant so I have kind of a duel family situation and whole heartedly agree to be an organ donor. Discuss it with your families."
Kollen Thompson is the organ procurement coordinator for the Nebraska Health Systems. Part of her job is going out and finding potential organ donors. Back in her office, Kollen checks this screen for any new additions to the list of possible organ recipients.
[Kollen Thompson] "The United Network of Organ Sharing is a computer system located in Richmond, Virginia and every transplant enter lists their patients on this list."
Right now over 64,000 people wait for organ transplants in the United States. The demand for kidneys is the highest. 42,000 men, women, and children are in need. Thousands more need new livers, hearts, lungs, and bowels. In Nebraska just under 400 are on the waiting list. 130 for kidneys, 126 for liver. Dozens of others need other organs. Nationally, almost 4,000 people have died while waiting for a donor, rich and poor, young and old.
[Kollen] "When people think that it has something to do with celebrity status, it has nothing to do with what we put people on the list for. "
Kollen is never too far away from her phone. She knows at any minute someone might call with a possible donor.
[Kollen] "I assist the physicians in coordinating the efforts to actually go out to the sites anywhere in the United States at a hospital where a family has consented to donation, and then we proceed with the donation process in the operating room, remove the organs, and then bring them back to the medical center here in Nebraska for transplantation."
But convincing people that organ donation is acceptable is harder. Making sure people take the necessary legal steps is even more daunting. The result? Some people who have their lives hanging in the balance must wait a year or more.
[Kollen] "It's approximately 500 days that someone would wait for a liver transplant currently in Nebraska on the United Network of Organ Sharing's list. That's a long time to wait. You can also get an organ in a day or a week depending on how sick you are, how long you have waited, and what your blood type is, and what your height and weight is and the potential donor that comes up and matches with your body size and blood type."
[Mary Eckhout] "On April 10th of 1997 I was taking Clint to Pius and I hit a patch of ice and slid and got broad sided."
At that moment Mary and Tim lost their oldest son, Clint, and their life was suddenly turned upsidedown.
[Mary] "I don't remember anything and about all I remember is being released to go to the funeral and then having to go right back to the hospital."
Arriving at the hospital, Tim was confronted with some serious questions even before he could absorb a horrible certainty. He was told the hospital staff was keeping Clint alive in the hopes of donating his organs.
[Tim Eckhout] "I remember after them asking me and I asked Mary when she was able to speak and we knew ahead of time that Clint would do that."
[Mary] "What was so ironic about it was just a week before my accident probably, I had -- I was talking to Clint and I had made mention about organs, and I said, you know, I think that if anything would happen to me and your dad, we would want our organs donated, and Clint said that that was not what our church believed in, and I told him that he needed to ask one of the priests at the church and find out because I said I'm sure that that is okay. He did just that because Clint followed up and kept up on things like that. He told me that he did ask and was told that that is okay. He said if anything would happen to me, I would want to do the same. You stop and think now, why did I have that conversation with a 15-year-old son. You know, you just don't normally."
While it is tough to have this type of conversation with a young adult, it is something more families should do. Right now only 10% of the people who are able to donate organs do, in fact, donate organs.
[Mary] "Just our own opinion or my own opinion, I think it's real selfish not to consider it. You never know where you're going to be. We certainly didn't think we would be here two years ago and, you know, I think you need to sit down and put your life and your family's life in perspective and think what if it was something that we would need. I truly believe Clint was in heaven long before we donated his organs so it's my opinion that we just helped somebody else's family or kids."
At the time of our interview with the Kavaliers, day plus five was going well. Low fluid count due to lack of interest in food has made it a daily routine for Rich to receive a couple of bottles of liquids. His platelet count was low but nothing to worry about. Rich will have a few good and a few bad days, but every day is one step closer to being cancer free.

Captioning by Nebraska Captioning Center, Lincoln, Nebraska .