Prime
Battling to survive with one kidney
Conrad Ruguda Riad after a dialysis at Mulago hospital. Photo by Brian Ssenoga.
What you need to know:
Born with one kidney, Conrad Ruguda, he has been living at the surgeon’s mercy since he was two. He now needs Shs 32m to replace the ailing kidney.
When you hear him crack a joke from the other end of the room, you might think all is well but 17-year-old Conrad Ruguda has certainly tested the spasms of one of the worst health complications there can ever be.
He was born with one kidney and that is what he has. Even before his second birthday, Ruguda had come face to face with the sharp edge of the surgeon’s scissors at Aga khan hospital in Nairobi.
“The doctors thought they could find a way of creating two kidneys for me out of the one I was born with but that was not successful and at nine years, I was back in the operating theatre to fix the problem which was getting more complex every day but this time it was in great Ormond Sreet Hospital, London” says Ruguda with a shaky voice.
According to Sandra Buyeka, Ruguda’s sister and caretaker, after the second operation, the family thought everything was now fine and life had returned to normal.
“But again he became sickly, complaining of several illnesses, including the swelling of some body parts. We suspected it might be the kidney again,” she says and quickly adds, “In September, he got worse and we took him to Mulago Hospital where Dr Simon Peter Eyoku confirmed our fears; Conrad’s only kidney was failing and without dialysis he could not survive.”
For close to eight months, Ruguda has had to endure the psychological pain of spending close to four hours on dialysis machine three times a week.
“I do not like that machine, it tortures seeing your blood flow through the tubes but you have nothing to do because you still know that if the process is not done, then your chances of seeing the sun the next day are minimal,” Ruguda says.
Despite the fact that it cleanses your blood of toxins, a function which would have otherwise been performed by the kidneys, the danger with the dialysis machine is that it also reduces the calcium levels in one’s body. In the case of Ruguda, he broke his left pelvic a month after he was put on dialysis confining him to a wheel chair.
“This is, of course, in addition to other opportunistic infections and diseases like hypertension. Sometimes, there is no money and instead of the three recommended times, I end up doing only one and by the time I do even that one, I am already swollen in the face, breathing is so difficult and with a lot of pain all over. It gets worse when you catch flu or cough. Some of the moments come when there is a shortage of water in the hospital and you are told to return the next day, but that is not as bad as power cut while you have just been put on the machine and an amount of your blood gets stuck in there.”
According to Dr Eyoku, Ruguda was taken to Mulago hospital, with a condition called obstructive orators.
This is when the tubes that take urine from the kidney to the bladder are blocked.
“By the time we established what was causing the blockage, his only kidney had failed and he had to be put on dialysis which has kept him going since then,” the doctor says.
The nephrologist explains that the cost of keeping a patient on dialysis for a year may total to more than Shs60m which can be used for a transplant in India.
However, the 17-year-old who missed his senior four exams last year at Vienna College, Namugongo because of the sickness, has already found a kidney donor-his sister who was found to be a match But still the two have to go to Nairobi for the final nucleus test before they can go to India for the transplant.
This kind of test cannot be done in Uganda due to lack of equipment and the least they need is Shs1m at Aga Khan Hospital in Nairobi.
Through friends, the family has been able to find another donor in India who has offered $20,000 (Shs50m) for treatment and are now appealing to well-wishers to help them raise the balance of $13,000 (Shs32m).
To help Conrad
Donations can be deposited on account number 7112411411, Diamond trust Bank under the name Ruguda Conrad Riad or mobile money on 0774983317.
