Father, Daughter Closer Than Ever Following Surprise Gift Of Life

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PITTSBURGH (KDKA) - It's been a long road for Mark Capets.

The 63-year-old had been battling Hepatitis C for years, but things took a turn for the worse a few months ago.

"I believe it was the fourth treatment that finally eradicated the Hep C, but the irony is after going through all this, which some of them were horrible, only to end up with liver cancer anyway," Capets said.

The only chance at survival was getting a liver transplant.

"I kind of accepted I'm either going to get a transplant or I'm not," he said.

"I was worried about him being on the transplant list because he was 62 at the time. He's a diabetic, so these things sometimes make you not the best candidate for surgery," Capets' daughter, Erin, said.

After talking with doctors, Mark and Erin, now 33, decided that finding a living donor would be the best option.

So, Erin did all she could to make that possible by creating a Facebook page and setting up a GoFundMe account in order to get the word out.

"Last year, we did more live donor transplants at our center than we did deceased donor transplants. More than 50 percent of our transplants were from a living donor," UPMC Chief of Transplants Dr. Abhi Humar said.

Dr. Humar said that statistic compares to just 3 percent of living donor transplants nationwide.

"The main reason the results are better is that we're able to do transplant in a more timely fashion. We don't have to wait until the patient is very ill," Dr. Humar said.

After hearing this, Erin realized she had to do something.

So, she got tested to see if she could be a living donor for her dad without telling anyone about it.

"If he were to die on that waiting list, and I would have never tried, I could never live with myself," she said.

A few weeks later, Erin got the good news that she was a match.

However, when she told her parents, they weren't too thrilled.

One reason was because she has a defibrillator in her chest to treat a heart arrhythmia. But, there was also another reason.

"If I would have survived and something happened to her, it would have killed me emotionally and spiritually and at that point, I'd be dead anyway," Mark said.

After some convincing, Erin and her dad went through the transplant surgery on July 17.

Part of Erin's liver was removed and transplanted into her dad.

"By about eight weeks after the donation, the liver regenerates close to 90 percent of its original size," Dr. Humar said.

Everything went smoothly.

Now, weeks after the surgery, they are doing better than ever and are even closer than they were before this journey began.

"I think he's happy now that everything is over and done with," Erin said.

"I can't express in words how I feel about my daughter making this sacrifice," Mark said.