A locksmith on campus has the key that could give his friend and co-worker the chance to live a normal life: a healthy kidney.

On Wednesday Doug Westbrook, locksmith at Facilities Planning and Management, will give one of his kidneys to his co-worker Marvin Allie, a mason in the department.

Allie has had Polycystic Kidney Disease, or PKD, for 24 years, but has not needed a transplant until recently.

PKD is the most common life-threatening genetic disease in America.

It causes multiple cysts to grow on each kidney until they can no longer function normally, which eventually leads to kidney failure.

If Allie didn’t get a kidney transplant, he said, he would have to undergo dialysis, a blood-cleansing procedure to rid the body of waste materials that unhealthy kidneys cannot remove.

“Without a kidney [Allie] would have to work, be on disability and go on dialysis three times a week, and that’s no life,” Westbrook said.

“Giving up one kidney is a no-brainer. There’s very little risk involved to me, and it’s going to give him a better quality of life.”

After working with each other for more than 18 years, Westbrook and Allie are close friends, they said.

“I think a lot of Doug,” Allie said. “He’s just doing a great thing, and there’s nothing I could ever do to pay him back.”

Allie was on a list to find a donor for four months when Westbrook offered to give him one of his own kidneys.

“I knew he had that Polycystic Kidney Disease, and he said, ‘someday I’m going to need a kidney,’ and I said, ‘well I’ll give you one of mine,'” Westbrook said.

“I’ve never donated anything before, but Marvin needs a kidney, so it didn’t seem like a real big deal to me.”

A suitable donor for Allie had to be healthy and have a compatible blood type.

“My significant other would have offered me one, but she was a completely different blood type,” Allie said.

“Doug and I were the same blood type, so it worked out.”

Allie could have gotten a kidney from a cadaver, but live donors are better than cadavers, Westbrook said, and both are better than dialysis.

“If he went on the dialysis, he’d only have an average of five years, and from a cadaver the prognosis was 10 years, and from a live donor 20 years,” Westbrook said.

The two long-time friends will drive to the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. this week for the operation.

After the surgery, Westbrook will remain at the hospital for two or three days, and then be able to return to normal life.

“I have no concerns over my health or safety because the Mayo clinic does four transplants every day, and they’ve never lost a donor,” Westbrook said. “I’m more concerned the operation is a success from Marvin Allie’s standpoint.”

Allie could take up to five weeks to recover, and will have to stay in Rochester for that time.

The new kidney will allow Allie to lead a longer life, but he will have to take a lot of medication so that his body does not reject the kidney.

“I’ll have to take 31 pills a day for anti-rejection,” Allie said. “Eventually, they told me, I would be weaned down to 15 pills. I’ll take that the rest of my life.”

Forrest Grabau, an insulator in facilities planning and management, donated one of his kidneys to his wife, Patricia, five years ago without serious complication, he said.

Unlike Allie, Patricia Grabau had kidney failure due to diabetes, and she was on dialysis before the operation.

After the transplant, Grabau said she didn’t have to worry about her kidneys as much, although there were difficulties.

“There is adjustment, and it’s a pain for a while,” she said.

“There were a couple episodes of rejection. That happens to everybody.”

Grabau said she hopes Allie’s transplant will go well this week.

“I hope for the best,” she said. “It worked fine for me; I hope he has as much luck.”

Allie said he is nervous about the operation, but he couldn’t be more grateful for this chance to get better.

“I’ll be able to put a few more years in,” Allie said. “Thanks to Doug, I’ll be able to enjoy them. Doug deserves the praise. He’s a very good friend, just a great person all around.”

On Thursday there will be a pizza fund-raiser at the carpenter shop for Allie in the facilities planning and management building.

“Even though the insurance covers [the transplant], there’s going to be a lot of incidental costs that Marvin’s going to have to cover,” Westbrook said.

“He’s going to be up there for five weeks, and he’s going to have some place to stay, so all the living expenses away from home, apartment and food and everything.”