The death of a New York woman saved the life of her brother who can now live a normal life only because of her kidneys.

Seung Hoon Lee, 38, of Queens was diagnosed with kidney failure in November, last year. He was so desperate he did not wanted to struggle for life anymore and refused dialysis. His sister, Sunyan Lee, 46, was the one who encouraged him to go on dialysis and get on a transplant waiting list.

“She is like a mother. My sister was always with me when I went to the doctor,” Lee told reporters gathered at North Shore University Hospital in Manhasset Monday after he underwent the transplant surgery, the New York Daily News reported.
Lee’s sister died unexpectedly of an aneurysm January 18. She had already signed up as an organ donor and the two were a 100 percent match.

“I feel her inside my body. I will be very careful in the future,” Lee said through a Korean interpreter.

Dr. Peter Walker, the North Shore medical director, said the surgery transplant was a success although the situation, which made it happen, was not fortunate. Without his sister’s death, Lee could have remained on the transplant list for months or years.

According to the New York Organ Donor Network, there are nearly 6,000 people in need of kidneys in the metropolitan area. With so many people on the kidney transplant list, Lee could have waited seven or more years to get a kidney. About 100,000 people are on the kidney transplant list, nationwide. About 6,000 of them die waiting each year.

The surgery was a real miracle, according to Lee’s doctors as he became one of the first transplant patients in New York to receive both kidneys from a relative, his sister.