Before last year, Merri Lazenby, RN, BSN, CCRN, CEN, admits she barely knew the burly security guard who long has helped protect nurses from rowdy patients in Delnor Hospital’s ED.

“I didn’t even know his last name,” Lazenby said of Ray Andrade, who has spent nearly 10 years as a guard at the Geneva, Ill., hospital. “There was a Ray A. and a Ray B., and they worked on the same shift. I just knew him as Ray A.”

Thanks to one conversation in the hospital’s cafeteria, Lazenby has ensured a lifetime connection with “Ray A.”

Both recently returned to work at Delnor after the 64-year-old Andrade, who had spent more than a year on dialysis, received a donated kidney Oct. 2 from Lazenby at Northwestern Memorial Hospital in Chicago.

“I can’t tell her how much I apppreciate it,” said Andrade, a diabetic. “It was so monumental.”

A glum Andrade was eating lunch alone when Lazenby and a coworker joined him one day in January 2009.

The conversation turned to Andrade’s mood, which he said was disappointment that his sister donating a kidney would cause her too many future health challenges.

“I said, ‘I have two kidneys, you can have one of mine,’” Lazenby said. “Never in a million years did I think I’d be a match.”

For a few weeks after the offer, their paths didn’t cross. However, the next time the two saw each other, Lazenby reaffirmed her offer. “I said, ‘I’m really not kidding,’” said Lazenby, who works in the ED and the hospital’s trauma services office. “He got so excited. He said, ‘I’ll call Northwestern and tell them I have another potential donor.’”

Months of paperwork and blood tests ensued, the match was confirmed and a surgery date set.

Lazenby, a 37-year-old mother of three and an avid runner, returned to work Dec. 1, albeit moving a bit slower than usual.

“It really through me for a loop,” Lazenby said of the recovery. “I ran a half marathon before my surgery. I was very active. I went from that to [not being able] to pick up my kids.”

After surgery, Lazenby’s workouts were far from the 13-mile variety. Instead, she was limited to going 1.2 mph on a treadmill. “That was the fastest I could go,” she said. “I am moving a little bit faster now.” On Jan. 31, Lazenby completed the 13th annual Kohl’s Step Up for Kids event, which involves climbing 80 flights of stairs at the Aon Center in Chicago. She also has registered for a half marathon in May in Rockford, Ill.

Andrade’s recovery was slowed by a seroma that ruptured, but he says he is feeling “great” since his return to work Jan. 10, except for a balky knee that he injured while serving in Vietnam.

Throughout the long donation process, Lazenby said a strong religious faith guided her.

“I’m so glad I did it,” she said. “It’s changed me for the better. When I get stressed, I’m a cryer. The whole time [before the surgery] I had such a peace about me. I was doing this blind walk of faith.”

Lazenby insists her decision to help Andrade was nothing extaordinary.

“We all have stuff that can change another person’s life,” Lazenby said. “I really didn’t do that much. I tell people, ‘I was just the parts guy.’ I gave him a part that I wasn’t using that won’t affect my life in the long run.”

Barry Bottino is a regional editor for Nursing Spectrum.