Family preparing for 10-year-old’s liver transplant waits for organ donation

By Meredith McDonough

Click here for updates on this story

    ORLANDO, Florida (WESH) — Jumping in the leaves and throwing the football around is a perfect day for the Goeller family.

While life seems great, Rick and Jess Goeller are preparing their 10-year-old son, Lucas, for another liver transplant.

“I can’t believe that we have to do this again,” parent Jess Goeller said.

When Lucas was just 2 years old, he was days away from death.

His mother was desperate to save him, waiting for a liver donation.

“The liver starts to fail. It’s just ugly. You just start to ride this fine line between life and death,” Goeller said.

Lucas got his miracle.

Her name was Olivia, and her mother chose Lucas to receive her daughter’s liver.

It was a direct donation, something rare, but it happened after Goeller put together an unstoppable social media campaign to save Lucas.

“Media just has such a wide reach and a click of a button, you can reach somebody across the other side of the world,” Goeller said.

From billboards to Facebook, thousands of families followed Lucas’ story, and so did WESH 2’s Meredith McDonough.

Goeller did an interview with WESH 2’s sister station in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. That’s where McDonough and Goeller were opponents in high school.

Then, they became teammates at Allegheny College in Meadville, Pennsylvania. Goeller was a sharpshooter who controlled the court.

WESH 2 talked with both Jess and Lucas about his journey.

Lucas is 10 years old. He loves to roughhouse with his three brothers, and he’s also a sharpshooter when it comes to hunting.

“Pheasants, turkeys,” Lucas said.

“Did you get a turkey for Thanksgiving?” McDonough asked.

“No, but I shot one a couple years ago,” Lucas said.

Lucas’ surgeon is the chief of pediatric transplantation at UPMC Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh.

Dr. George Mazariegos comes to Orlando at least twice a month.

He and his team started a collaboration with AdventHealth to provide pediatric liver transplant services.

They’ve performed 12 transplants this year in Orlando and nearly 60 over the past six years.

“It’s been a fantastic collaboration where we work with their transplant colleagues, with our transplant surgical team to provide very specialized care in pediatric liver transplant that the team here wanted to develop to serve the children here in Orlando,” Mazariegos said.

The Regional Transplant Network is one of a kind and Mazariegos is working to make their practices more common for the nearly 350 children waiting for a liver in the U.S.

Mazariegos says 80% of his transplants are split livers.

That means his team splits the liver, helping a child and an adult.

“We did that here in Orlando. You know, this week, we had a liver that was a precious gift that was that was given by a deceased donor. We helped the child who’s doing well and an adult at the same time. And that is really what the goal of how we can solve this organ shortage issue for children,” Mazariegos said.

Allocation of an organ is complex and based on medical need.

There is not a separate list for adults and children. It’s an algorithm that factors in the acuity, age and location of the patient and where the donor lives.

“Our belief is that we could get those 350 children transplants in the country by doing split techniques, prioritizing children and really not impact in any negative way the adults who also need that liver transplant,” Mazariegos said.

Mazariegos commends parents like the Goellers for bringing so much attention to this lifesaving topic.

“I believe that Jess and her story and her process with Lucas really helped to spark a new way of awareness, to raise awareness for organ donation,” Mazariegos said.

Goeller has started another campaign to help save Lucas.

This time, a living donor is also an option.

Someone with an O blood type between the ages of 20 and 49 with a BMI of less than 30 could be the right fit.

“We’ve seen before what the gift of life that Lucas received the first time it was miraculous. I mean, he went from not being able to walk or talk or run or play with his brothers to participating in life,” Goeller said. “We hope to use this momentum to help Lucas and give him that chance to grow into adulthood and get married and have five boys for boys, his own frat house, right? So that’s why we’re starting this campaign sooner rather than later. And hopefully, we can help a lot of people as well. And that’s the goal.”

The Goeller family says this has been a long journey for the entire family, but they lean on each other and their faith to get through.

Please note: This content carries a strict local market embargo. If you share the same market as the contributor of this article, you may not use it on any platform.