Severely Burned Athlete/Model Thanks Tissue Donors In New Providence

NEW PROVIDENCE, NJ — Turia Pitt, an Australian elite athlete and former model and mining engineer, owes her life to tissue donors after more than 65 percent of her body was severely burned in a freak firestorm.

“It’s crazy to think that I am only really alive because of donations from 16 Americans,” Pitt told Patch.

Pitt was competing in a 100-kilometer ultra-marathon in the Australian outback when she and another runner were tapped in the fire.

“I was medivaced out and doctors knew I needed a skin donation,” Pitt said. “My kidneys were failing and I was in a really critical state. If didn’t get a tissue donation by that afternoon I was going to be dead.”

Australian doctors turned to MTF, a leading U.S. tissue bank headquartered in Edison. Where 16 Americans from Pennsylvania, New York, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota and Washington.
donated skin tissue to save her life.

“When I got the donation I had a significant turnaround, my kidney improved and I was in stable condition,” Pitt said.

Pitt visited the NJ Sharing Network in New Providence on Dec. 16 to thank some tissue donors.

Pitt met with the wife of one of a donor — her husband who passed away 8 years ago.

“It’s very humbling to be here,” Pitt said. “It’s really humbling to see the impact that one donor can have on a family and it’s good for her to see her husband still lives on other people… After I received my donation, I resolved to live the best I can to honor those donations.”

And Turia is doing just that.

Turia will travel to Pasadena, California, to ride on the Donate Life Rose Parade Float on Jan. 2. Each year, MTF sponsors a participant in the Donate Life Rose Parade Float. Turia is MTF’s 2017 honoree.

The float honors millions of people touched by organ, eye and tissue donation, including living donors, donor families, transplant recipients and transplant candidates.

Turia’s amazing recovery has allowed her to reclaim her status as an elite athlete and complete the Ironman World Championships in Hawaii. She was featured in the recent NBC coverage of the iconic challenge.

About Tissue Donation

“Tissue donation” is the term used to describe the donation of skin, bone, tendons, ligaments, heart valves and veins from a donor at the time of death. The grafts formed prepared from these donated tissues can dramatically improve the quality of life for recipients, and even save lives. One tissue donor can restore health and provide healing to more than 75 people.

Tissue donation helps more than 1.75 million Americans each year:

• Donated heart valves can replace damaged ones, allowing the heart to function well again.
• Spinal grafts help patients with back injuries or severe back pain resume active, pain-free lives.
• Musculoskeletal tissue replaces bone, tendons and ligaments lost to cancer, severe trauma, degenerative joint disease, arthritis and other injuries and conditions.
• Skin can save the lives of burn victims.
• Skin can also help people with a variety of defects and deformities, such as breast reconstruction following mastectomy, hernias and abdominal wall repairs, as a wound cover for diabetic ulcers and other chronic wounds.

To register to be an organ or tissue donor visit www.DonateLife.net.

(Images provided)

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