Annual UCSF Pediatric Transplant Picnic Celebrates Life

UCSF | Leland Kim 
Photo: Bradrick Thurman, 19, right, has remained close with Chris Mudge ever since he had his transplant surgery as an infant at UCSF Benioff Children's Hospital.

Several hundred people gathered for a picnic at McNears Beach in San Rafael to celebrate something much bigger than just the end of summer. Each family there was celebrating the life of a loved one who has undergone an organ transplant surgery at UCSF Benioff Children’s Hospital.

The annual event, now in its 18th year, also is a way for former patients to reunite with each other and the medical staff who saw them through so much of their childhoods.

“When I first came to the hospital, I had a 2-percent chance to live, and I survived,” said Bradrick Thurman, who was born with a rare life-threatening autoimmune disease.

Thanks to the team at UCSF, Thurman not only survived, but 19 years later, he’s excelling as a college student studying psychology. “I feel really special for being put here,” he said. “And I feel like I was put here for a purpose now that God let me survive what I was going through.”




______________________________________________________ 
"You have the power to SAVE lives." 
To register as a donor TODAY
In California: 
www.donateLIFEcalifornia.org | www.doneVIDAcalifornia.org 
Outside California: 
www.organdonor.gov | www.donatelife.net

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