Media Release
Udupi, July 7: Many believe organ donation is only for the young. A 76-year-old woman from coastal Karnataka has shown an entire community just how wrong that belief is.
When 76-year-old Jenny D' Souza, a homemaker from the quiet coastal town of Gangolli, breathed her last at Kasturba Hospital, Manipal, her family did something few families ever imagine possible at that age. They chose to donate her organs.
She had been brought to the hospital after a sudden spell of giddiness that, within hours, progressed to loss of consciousness due to a massive brain haemorrhage. Despite every effort by the medical team, she was certified brain dead in accordance with established medical protocols.
It was then, at the very moment their hearts were breaking, that her family made a choice of extraordinary grace. Looking beyond their grief, they asked a question too few families think to ask: could she still help someone?
The answer was yes.
Age was no barrier.
At 76, Jenny became an organ and tissue donor. Her liver will offer a fresh chance at life to a patient with liver failure, her eyes will restore sight to someone who has known only darkness, and her skin will help heal those scarred by burns.
This is the part so many people do not know—and the message her family now hopes every family will hear. You are never too old to save a life. A 76-year-old can be a donor. What matters is not the number of years a person has lived, but the willingness, in one final moment, to give.
The donation was carried out in coordination with Jeevasarthakathe, Karnataka's State Organ and Tissue Transplant Organisation.
Speaking on the occasion, Dr Sudhakar Kantipudi, chief operating officer, MAHE Teaching Hospitals, said, "We often think of organ donation as something meant for the young. This family, whose loved one was seventy-six, has taught us otherwise. In the darkest hour of their lives, they chose to give life to others. Age is not a barrier to compassion or to donation. Let her memory be the reason a hundred more families say yes."
The hospital placed on record its profound gratitude to the family for their courage and compassion at a time of unimaginable loss, and to the treating teams and transplant coordinators whose sensitivity made this final act of generosity possible.
Jenny D' Souza lived a full and quiet life by the sea. In death, she showed that it is never, ever too late to save a life, leaving behind a legacy that will endure in the lives of those she has helped.