Alan Finkelstein has a music room in his mom’s Little Neck apartment. He’s a mostly self-taught guitarist who enjoys playing original instrumentals.
“I get a lot of my ideas out there,” he told us. “It’s how I get a lot – work through a lot of my own emotions. I guess it’s my therapy and my therapist.”
The 21-year-old bio-chemistry major can be excused if he indulges in some music therapy. He endured an experience none of would ever want to have.
Alan had medical problems as an infant. They resulted in his having only half of a functioning kidney. It did well for him. But now it’s failing. He’s getting dialysis but needs a kidney transplant. Last year his brother, Jason offered one of his kidneys.
“My brother was very generous, he really didn’t think of it too much. He just said that I needed it and he was gonna do it.”
Last June the surgery took place at New York Presbyterian/Columbia. It failed.
“They did an ultrasound and they realized it had kinked on the artery and it wasn’t working. There was no blood flow to it.”
So Alan still needed a transplant and his brother was out a kidney.
“They basically had to pick me up off the floor, ” says Alan’s dad, Len.
Now Alan is hoping a donor comes forward. We only need one kidney to live normally and the screening is thorough. There’s relatively little risk to donors.
Alan wants to go to medical school and do research on artificial organs.
If you want to find out about donating and helping someone who wants to make the world a better place, email me at HOWARDSHELPERS@PIX11.COM
We’ll make sure you get the information. As Alan puts it, donating an organ is the ultimate form of charity.
“He has a great attitude,” his mom, Nina told us. “Right now we’re hoping he gets a kidney so he can have a social life, finish medical school, become a great musician, whatever he’d like to do.”
