Cami Loritz, a transplant intensive care unit nurse at Froedtert Hospital in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, donated a portion of her liver to an 8-year-old boy who was in danger of losing his life to acute liver failure. The extraordinary act of solidarity saved him.

In late April 2019, Brayden Auten of Wrightstown, Wisconsin, came home from elementary school with what seemed like a stomach bug. Within a day his skin and eyes turned yellow. Doctors determined that a rapidly progressing virus had severely damaged his liver. Unlike kidney failure, which can be managed temporarily with dialysis, irreversible liver failure leaves no alternative other than transplantation. Family members and friends were tested as potential living donors, but none were compatible.

Cami Loritz, then 25, worked in the very transplant ICU that cared for patients like Brayden. She had already registered as a living donor, inspired in part by her father’s earlier kidney donation to a relative and by other patients’ stories. When she learned she was a match for Brayden, she volunteered without hesitation. On May 14, 2019, surgeons at Froedtert Hospital removed a portion of her liver; the same day, the graft was transplanted into Brayden at Children’s Hospital of Wisconsin.

Because the liver is the only solid organ that regenerates, both Cami’s remaining liver and the portion transplanted into Brayden were expected to grow back to full size and function within about a year. The surgeries were successful. In the weeks that followed, both donor and recipient recovered well. Brayden regained strength, returned to school and play, and the two later posed together showing their matching surgical scars—one of the most widely shared images of their story.

Cami has spoken about the unique nature of living liver donation: two people enter surgery alive and both leave alive. The Auten family has described her as a “true miracle” and now considers her part of their extended family. Their experience has also been used to raise public awareness of living organ donation and the ongoing shortage of organs available for transplant.

The story of Cami Loritz and Brayden Auten stands as a powerful example of professional compassion extended into personal sacrifice, and of the life-saving potential of living donation when a compatible stranger steps forward.

Sources

• CNN, ABC News, WISN, and related 2019 reports on Cami Loritz (transplant ICU nurse at Froedtert Hospital) donating a portion of her liver to 8-year-old Brayden Auten after he developed acute viral liver failure; details of the May 14, 2019, surgeries, successful recoveries, and subsequent awareness efforts