COUNTYWIDE : Sisters Close in Sickness and Health

Over the years, Therese Palacio has taken care of her younger sister, Deborah, in typical “big sister” fashion. While she might tease Deborah on occasion, Therese would bristle at anyone else who picked on her sister.

When their parents left them with an aunt in their native Belize for nine months while they settled in the United States, Therese, then 9, felt an even greater sense of responsibility for her 7-year-old sibling.

So when Deborah was found six years ago to be suffering kidney failure, that sense of responsibility prompted Therese, now 30, to offer one of her kidneys to her sister.

“I knew if I could do something to make her better, I had to do it,” said Therese, a buyer for UCI Medical Center who lives in Moreno Valley.

Last November, after six years of dialysis and two rejected transplants, Deborah received the ultimate gift from her sister. In a 20-hour operation at UCLA Medical Center, surgeons removed one of Therese’s healthy kidneys and transplanted it to Deborah.

A child care assistant for Los Angeles Unified School District, Deborah at first rejected her sister’s offer to donate a kidney.

“I didn’t think it was necessary if there was a possibility of a cadaver transplant,” Deborah said. “But at every turn she said she was ready to do it.”

After her body rejected two cadaver transplants, Deborah decided she should accept her sister’s offer. “I was more nervous for her,” Deborah said. “I had been through the surgery before so I knew what to expect.”

The procedure concluded two years of compatibility tests to determine if Therese’s kidney would be a good match. A team of physicians evaluated the sisters’ mental and emotional condition and, after canceling surgery once to run more tests, scheduled the transplant.

In adjoining operating rooms, surgeons removed Therese’s kidney while another surgical team prepped Deborah to receive the organ.

Initially, Deborah rejected the kidney when a muscle cut off circulation. Surgeons repositioned the kidney and inserted it into Deborah’s abdominal cavity, where it immediately began functioning on its own.

Two days later, Deborah was out of bed visiting her sister, whose recovery took a few days longer.

“The doctors said the surgery would be harder on me but I didn’t believe them,” Therese said. “I was naive and thought I would bounce back right away.”

It took time for Therese’s body to get used to functioning with just one kidney, but Deborah’s health improved drastically. This created a unique situation for the sisters, with Deborah taking over the role of the stronger sister while Therese recuperated in bed.

“She was like a whirlwind, mopping the floor a few days after the surgery,” Therese said. “I said: ‘Watch out, you’re going to hurt my kidney.’ ”

When she thinks about the surgery, Therese rarely focuses on the loss of one of her kidneys, or on the two months she was off work to recuperate. Instead she thinks about the vast improvement in her sister’s health.

“It’s really amazing to think about,” she said. “It’s like a miracle.”

Deborah agrees, but adds that her sister is amazing too: “She shrugs off what she did, but it was really special.”

The two celebrated the apparently successful operation by attending a recent Gladys Knight concert at the Celebrity Theatre in Anaheim. A UCI Medical Center employee arranged for the sisters and their mother to meet Knight after the performance.

Always close, Therese and Deborah are making plans to take a cruise next January. Therese jokes that they will have to continue seeing each other regularly so she can keep tabs on her other kidney.

A single mother of two daughters, Therese has remained upbeat and positive from the time she was first considered as a potential donor two years ago. There have been no second thoughts, she said, nor is she worried about the possibility that her sister could still reject the donated kidney.

“It boils down to Deborah being healthy,” Therese said. “She would do the same for me.”