Annual Charles City Donate Life ceremony highlights personal impact of organ donation

By Bob Steenson, bsteenson@charlescitypress.com

Floyd County Medical Center marked the beginning of National Donate Life Month on Tuesday with its annual ceremony recognizing organ, eye and tissue donors and the recipients whose lives have been changed by those gifts.

Hospital CEO Dawnett Willis welcomed the more than two dozen community members and FCMC staff who attended and emphasized the importance of organ, eye and tissue donation awareness and education.

“In my career, I’ve been a part of seeing the other side of it. Personally, I am an organ donor. It’s super easy to do. At the DMV, it’s not hard to check that box and give the gift of life to people,” Willis said, talking about checking the organ donor box when renewing a driver’s license.

Guest speaker at the event was Roxanne Meek of Charles City, who told about her experience as a living kidney donor making a non-directed donation.

Meek said she was inspired by hearing about the 2024 Donate Life ceremony at FCMC that included the story of sisters Becky Reimers and Marianne Nielsen, both hospital employees.

Reimers had wanted to help her sister, who had kidney disease, but she was not a match. She instead made a non-directed donation, which allowed Nielsen to move up on the transplant list and receive a kidney sooner.

After hearing that story, Meek said, she reached out to Reimers about her experience then signed up online to be a donor a few days later, on April 4.

Meek described the months-long evaluation process, which included video calls with doctors and social workers, a couple of days of medical testing in Rochester and logistics planning.

She found out she was eligible to be a donor on July 17.

Since the donor was not yet known she could pick the time she wanted to donate, choosing the winter when it’s not as nice outside and she’s slower at work in her job as a hairdresser.

“They waited until Monday, Dec. 2, to put my name into the registry. And on Friday, Dec. 20, I got the call that I matched somebody,” she said. “The surgery went great – took two hours. The doctor said I had a beautiful kidney. … He took a picture of mine.”

She said her recovery also went well. All of the expenses, including medical testing, lost wages, meals, travel and all her medical expenses before and after her surgery were covered.

Meek said she doesn’t know who her kidney went to, but hopes to find out.

“All I know is it was flown out to California. I’m still hoping to hear from them, I haven’t yet,” she said. “They said most of the time they do want to know who you are, but sometimes not. I’m hopeful that I will hear yet.”

When the audience was asked if anyone else wanted to speak, Marilyn Venz of Charles City went to the front of the room a little hesitantly.

“I didn’t know I was going to be doing this,” she said. “My husband is in the back corner. Ron Venz. He had a kidney transplant back in 2019.”

Marilyn Venz told the story of how Ron’s kidney began to fail and she wanted to give him one of hers, but she was not able to be a donor. A family friend offered to donate, but she was not a match, but then the friend’s husband said he would try and he was “a perfect match,” Venz said.

Once he had been approved to donate he said they should pick a date. They called Mayo and asked when the first chance to do it would be.

“And he said, ‘We can do it on Feb. 20,’ and I’m getting like goosebumps,” Venz said. “That’s Ron’s birthday. That’s my husband’s birthday.”

Ron Venz received a new kidney on his birthday, Feb. 20, 2019.

“I said it’s like rebirth,” Marilyn Venz said.

Heather Hobert, the Medical Center’s human resources director, shared the story of her stepfather, who died in 2023. She described him as someone who regularly helped others without being asked.

“He helped friends and family, of course, but his heart was also wide open to complete strangers. He was always there to lend a helping hand, no matter how big or how small the need was. His kindness knew no bounds. It was literally the hallmark of who he was,” she said.

“When we faced the unimaginable and suddenly had to say goodbye, we knew that his spirit of giving wouldn’t end with his passing. As a family, we made the decision to honor his wishes by donating his eyes and tissue, gifts that would continue to change lives just as he had done in life,” she said.

“What an incredible gift to know that his eyes are helping someone see the world again, and to know that his tissue has helped someone heal, giving them maybe the ability to walk again or simply live without pain that they once knew.”

Also part of the observance was the presentation of the Medical Center’s Donate Life Tree, and an invitation for people to write names in blue-green ribbons and hang them on the tree in honor of organ, eye and tissue donors and recipients.

The event typically includes gathering around a flagpole where the Donate Life flag would be raised, but this year the entire event was held indoors because of the ongoing FCMC hospital and clinic addition construction project.

A Donate Life flag was attached to the wall in the Veteran’s Room where the event was held, but another Donate Life was also fixed high atop the project by a member of the construction crew on the corner of the three-story addition, where it whipped briskly in the wind.

According to the Iowa Donor Network, 130 Iowans donated organs in 2024, resulting in 387 transplants. Another 1,118 Iowans gave tissue for donation. More than 104,000 people nationwide are currently waiting for an organ transplant, including 593 in Iowa.

National Donate Life Month is observed each April to raise awareness of organ and tissue donation and to honor donors and their families.

Roxanne Meek of Charles City talks about her experience being a living kidney donor for someone she’s never met, inspired to become a donor by the story of sisters Becky Reimers and Marianne Nielsen. Marianne needed a kidney and Becky wanted to donate, but she wasn’t a match for her sister, so she donated to an anonymous recipient, which moved Marianne up on the donation list. Press photo by Bob Steenson

Marilyn Venz of Charles City talks during the Donate Life Day ceremony Tuesday morning about the experience of her husband, Ron, receiving a kidney from a family friend several years ago. Press photo by Bob Steenson

A construction crew member works on the roof of the Floyd County Medical Center addition while the Donate Life flag flaps briskly  in the wind, Tuesday morning after the Donate Life ceremony at the Medical Center. Press photo by Bob Steenson