‘It was a long shot, but organ donation saved my daughter’s life’

One snowy night 20 years ago, a bleeper Sarah Gascoyne had been carrying for months suddenly went off. Within hours, her little girl was being blue-lighted from Grantham to London for a double lung transplant.

It was a moment Sarah knew would change both their lives forever.

Four-year-old Annabelle had been diagnosed with primary pulmonary hypertension and needed the transplant to survive. They had waited a year for a donor, knowing the call could come at any time, or not at all.

“There wasn’t much hope,” she recalls of their nerve-wracking experience. “At the time, it was a terminal illness.”

Even after the bleeper blared and they were rushed to Great Ormond Street Hospital, they were told survival was a long shot.

“She was so small and so young, and they’d never done anybody of that size and age for her condition and what she was receiving before,” says Sarah, now 50.

After an eight-hour operation, the family were told the transplant had been successful.

Now, two decades on, Sarah is recounting their story to encourage more people to have crucial conversations with their families about organ donation.

It follows a BBC investigation last year that found families were increasingly turning down requests to donate a relative’s organs, sometimes because that person’s wishes were unknown.

Nine weeks after the transplant, Annabelle was ready to come home. “It was the day before my 30th birthday,” Sarah recalls with a smile.

The family began to “rebuild their lives”, but the road to recovery for transplant patients is not a straightforward one, she adds.

When Annabelle was eight, she developed complications following a type of transplant cancer called post-transplant lymphoma.

The condition can develop in people who have had treatment to suppress their immune system after a transplant, according to the charity Lymphoma Action.

It meant going through chemotherapy, but Annabelle survived and, now 25, has “taken back control” of her life, Sarah says.

She continued seeing doctors in London for 16 years and still receives medical support.

“It could have been very, very different, but Annabelle’s sort of a fighter.”

Families face emotional complexities in the aftermath of an organ transplant, says Sarah, whose son – just three at the time – was also affected.

“It doesn’t just affect the person that’s having the transplant, it affects the whole family.”

Since 2020, an “opt-out” law has operated in England, meaning all adults are considered to be potential donors unless they have opted out.

People who record a decision not to donate are excluded.

However, the final decision lies with families who can override a loved one’s wish to donate. Last year, figures showed more families were refusing donation, with the consent rate falling from 69% to 61% over the course of four years.

Statistics from NHS Blood and Transplant, published this month, showed 108 people were waiting for a transplant in Lincolnshire.

There were 55 organ transplants “due to deceased donors” in the county in 2024-25.

More than 8,000 people are waiting in the UK as a whole.

Sarah hopes more people will discuss organ donation with their loved ones.

“It’s always a conversation that we’ve had,” she says. “I’m definitely on the register.”

She knows the past 20 years could have been very different.

“Annabelle was five and got to 25, she’s doing really well,” she adds. “She wouldn’t have had that chance without organ donation.”

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