Library to host organ donor event
By Joey Pitchford
Published in News on August 6, 2018 5:50 AM
The Wayne County Public Library and Donate Life North Carolina will host an organ donor information session Tuesday that will feature several speakers who will share how their lives have been affected by donating or receiving an organ.
Sandra Coley, a professor of theology at Shaw University's Apex School of Divinity, is organizing and leading the event, which will begin at 6 p.m. at the library, at 1001 E. Ash St. Tuesday marks the last day of National Minority Organ and Tissue Donation week. Coley is asking that community members come out to learn how organ donations work and the impact they make.
"We will have three speakers, one who is representing a donor, one who is an organ recipient and this year, we have a speaker who is waiting to receive a kidney," Coley said.
The first speaker will be Sharon Warren, wife of Hooks Grove Baptist Church pastor Harold Warren. Sharon Warren donated a kidney to her husband, Coley said, and will speak about her experience as a donor.
Willie Lewis, pastor at Pentecostal Holy Church in Goldsboro, will speak from the perspective of an organ recipient, and Patricia Whitfield will speak on being a dialysis patient who is waiting for a kidney.
"We'll have information tables as well," Coley said. "We're trying to raise awareness of all three areas."
Coley has an academic history in regards to organ donation, having written her doctoral dissertation on "the need and process for organ donation within the African-American community," she said. The African-American community is in particular need of organ donations, Coley said, even though many donate organs at a similar rate to people of other racial groups.
"African-Americans make up about 12 percent of the population, and we donate at 12 percent," she said. "But the problem comes because many African-Americans suffer from kidney disease due to hypertension, so we need to increase our donations even more."
Coley's interest in organ donation goes beyond the intellectual, however. In 2008, her son, Demetrius Coley, died in a drowning accident, and Sandra Coley had to make a decision on whether or not to donate his organs. Sandra Coley and her son had discussed the issue previously, and she knew what her son would have wanted.
"When Demetrius died, because I knew he wanted to be an organ donor, it was easy for me,' she said. "I suffered. I went through a pain, but my pain became a passion for me."
Donate Life North Carolina manages the state's donor registry. For more information, contact Coley at 919-221-8633 or visit www.donatelifenc.org.