Donor Family Stories

MTF is honored to improve the lives of patients through the generosity of donors and their families. We hope their stories inspire you to consider donation.

Hal’s Story: A Mother Receives a Surgical Graft From Her Son’s Tissue Donation

Robin Heitmann of Terry, Mississippi, received a tissue donation from her son, Hal (in photograph).

On April 5, 2003, Hal Heitmann, a senior at Terry High School in Terry, Mississippi was involved in a fatal car accident. Parents, Robin and Henry Heitmann, summoned to the scene, were asked to make a decision that a parent never intends to make for a child: tissue and organ donation.

They knew this was something their son would have wanted to do. "He was such a generous young man," said Robin. "He gave more to others during his brief 18 years than many people experience in a lifetime. He would have thought donation was so cool."

A few months following Hal’s funeral, Robin called the Mississippi Organ Recovery Agency in Jackson to ask how the tissue would be used and if there was any information on the tissue recipients. When it was mentioned that human tissue grafts are used for spinal fusions, it struck a familiar note—she was getting ready to have spinal fusion surgery herself.

"I immediately asked if my son’s tissue could be used for my spinal fusion," said Robin. "I was asked if I could emotionally handle something like that. My spine is what holds me up. It would be like my son supporting me through all of this. It seemed meant to be."

The Musculoskeletal Transplant Foundation was able to meet Robin’s needs by preparing some of Hal’s tissue to specifically meet her surgeon’s request. Robin’s surgery was successfully performed on July 22, 2003.

Reverend Bowles’ Story

For Reverend Lee H. Bowles of Dallas, Texas, the decision to consent to tissue donation for his son, Ron, involved confronting an old prejudice. "I used to have tremendous hang-ups about donation," he recalls. But on May 1, 1996, the father of ten and Assistant Pastor at the Miracle Temple Fellowship non-denominational church had to face his feelings when his son died suddenly of heart failure. Ron, who had a long history of hypertension (high blood pressure), was only 45-years old.

Reverend Bowles and his family had talked about donation in the past, and Lee knew that his son would have supported it. Lee had also discussed it with his second wife, Brenda. (His first wife and Ron’s mother died in 1976 from the same condition that took her son). But Lee still had doubts when he received a call from the local tissue procurement organization. Asked if he would consider donation for his son, Lee remembers thinking to the first "gift giver" and the Biblical story of God’s donation of Adam’s rib to create Eve. "God brought me around," he says of this decision to consent, and he has since become a vocal advocate for donation.