July 9, 1998
Double lung transplant recipient plans to ride the STP in one day
Almost five years to the day after receiving a double-lung transplant at University of Washington Medical Center, cystic fibrosis patient Ken Price plans to ride in the annual Seattle-to-Portland bicycle trek this weekend.
It’s the fifth straight year that Price, 35, has ridden in the 200-mile annual event. The first time was just a year after his transplant. Most people take two days to complete the trip, but Price joined the elite riders in the field last year by going the whole distance in one day. He crossed the finish line in about 15 1/2 hours, despite the challenges of wind and rain. This year, he hopes to roll into Portland in even less time.
“I love biking,” says Price, “and I got fit so quickly after getting my new lungs that I was able to do the ride just a year after my transplant.” In fact, he was out hitting a tennis ball just four weeks after the transplant, which took place on July 7, 1993.
Price, a Boeing aerospace engineer who lives in Issaquah, is a co-founder of Team Spare Parts, a group of transplantees who make the STP an annual event. This year, about 10 recipients of donor organs will ride to Portland.
Price says the lung transplant has essentially cured him of the lung problems caused by cystic fibrosis, although he will continue to take anti-rejection medication for the rest of his life. He sees his pulmonologist, Dr. Moira Aitken, associate professor of medicine at UW Medical Center, two or three times a year.
“The advent of lung transplantation has further opened the door for increased life expectancy with cystic fibrosis, as evidenced by Ken’s fifth transplant birthday,” said Aitken. “However, only about 150 CF patients receive transplants each year, and there is a continuing need for more donor organs.”
Price is grateful for his new lease on life, and promotes organ donation at every opportunity.
“The fact that I, along with many other transplant recipients, am riding my bike to Portland is evidence that transplants work,” he said. “We are all examples of active, productive people who have been given back to our families and friends. Life is a blessing, for which we thank the generosity of our donor families and the skill of our doctors and their staffs for making it possible.”
UW Medical Center began doing lung transplants in 1992. As of the end of June, a total of 81 patients had been transplanted, including 31 who received double-lung transplants. The double-lung transplants include 14 patients with cystic fibrosis.
Facts about cystic fibrosis from the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation:
* Cystic fibrosis (CF) is the most common fatal genetic disease in the United States today.
* CF causes the body to produce an abnormally thick, sticky mucus. This abnormal mucus clogs the lungs and leads to fatal infections. The thick CF mucus also obstructs the pancreas, preventing enzymes from reaching the intestines to digest food.
* CF affects approximately 30,000 children and young adults. It occurs in approximately one of every 3,300 live births. Approximately 1,000 new cases are diagnosed each year, usually by the age of three. The median age of survival for a person with CF is 31 years.
* One in 29 Americans — more than 10 million people — is an unknowing, symptomless carrier of the defective gene.
* A individual must inherit a defective copy of the CF gene — one from each parent — to have cystic fibrosis. Each time two carriers conceive a child, there is a 25 percent chance that the child will have CF; a 50 percent chance that the child will be a carrier; and a 25 percent chance that the child will be a non-carrier.
* The basic defect in CF cells is the faulty transport of sodium and chloride (salt) within epithelial cells — which line organs such as the lungs and pancreas — to their outer surfaces.
