The Paediatric Medicine Centre has carried out a unique operation: two little girls received kidney transplants from the same donor at the same time. The donor organs were shared between Sofia, aged 2 years and 9 months, and four-year-old Bozhena from the Zhytomyr region. Although their families did not know each other before, the girls are now united by a shared story of fighting for their health.
The children received treatment and surgery at the Paediatric Nephrology, Dialysis and Kidney Transplant Clinic of the Paediatric Medicine Centre. The clinic provides all the main methods of renal replacement therapy — haemodialysis, peritoneal dialysis and low-flow techniques — and performs kidney transplants for children from all over Ukraine.
Sofia was admitted to the centre on Christmas Eve 2025 after a severe infection and pneumonia, which led to acute kidney failure. Despite prolonged treatment, it was not possible to restore her kidney function, so the girl required peritoneal dialysis, which was started at the clinic. Sofia waited less than a year for a donor kidney.
“Everything was unexpected for us, because we did not think it would all happen so quickly. During the night we got a phone call telling us there was a potential donor. We packed and came here. Everything went well, including the operation. Now the child is feeling well. We are very grateful to all the doctors and staff at the centre,” says Sofia’s mother, Viktoriia Rybalko.
Bozhena, from Zhytomyr oblast, was born with a congenital malformation of the urinary system and needed dialysis from the first days of her life. She first received treatment at the Okhmatdyt children’s hospital in Kyiv, and from 2024 continued therapy at the Paediatric Medicine Centre, where for four years she was on peritoneal dialysis while waiting for a transplant.
According to nephrologist Roman Andrunevych, head of the Paediatric Nephrology, Dialysis and Kidney Transplant Clinic, the centre is able to admit children from all over the country, add them to the waiting list and perform organ transplant operations. He also thanked colleagues at the University Hospital, Dmytro Bershlei and Roman Sobko, for their ongoing support during such procedures.
The decision to carry out simultaneous transplants for two children became possible after a potential donor — a 49-year-old man — was confirmed in Kyiv. A team of surgeons travelled to the capital to retrieve the donor organs, while colleagues at the Paediatric Medicine Centre began preparing for the two operations in parallel on two operating tables.
By the time the transplant surgeons returned from Kyiv with the donor kidneys, the surgical teams had already completed the initial stages of the procedures, so all that remained was to implant the organs in both patients. In total, the simultaneous operation lasted about five hours.
At present, Sofia and Bozhena are feeling well, and their test results are within normal limits. Bozhena’s mother notes that previously her daughter was allowed to drink only up to 500 ml of fluid a day, whereas now, for the first time in a long while, such strict restrictions are no longer in place. For the girls’ discharge from hospital, the clinic team prepared symbolic gifts, including water bottles.
Doctors emphasise that dialysis is a necessary measure that sustains a child’s life but does not restore full health. A kidney transplant, on the other hand, according to nephrologists, gives young patients the chance to socialise, attend nursery and school, and live without being constantly tied to machines and medical procedures.
The founder and director of the Wings of Hope charity foundation, Nataliia Lipska, attended Sofia and Bozhena’s celebratory discharge. The foundation has helped create modern conditions in the clinic, supporting the development of paediatric nephrology and transplantation at the Paediatric Medicine Centre.
Staff at the medical facility stress that this is a place where in the past children would spend years on dialysis and often lose social contact, but now have the chance to return to a normal childhood. The centre’s team expressed their sincere condolences to the donor’s family and thanked them for the difficult decision in favour of posthumous organ donation, which made it possible to save the lives of two children at once.