by lauren filippini (alpha chi, butler university), marketing and communications manager
On August 17, 2024 a helicopter touched down at NYU Langone Health in New York City carrying donated lungs. The story of who those lungs were going to and how they arrived is one of strength, hope and the power of connection.
Jennifer Hart Dunlea was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF) when she was 2. For two decades, she and her mother Laurel Wyner Dunlea (Epsilon Rho, University of Delaware) have fought for a better life for Jen. CF is a progressive genetic disease that affects the lungs, pancreas and other organs. There is no cure, and while medications have helped a small number of those with the disease, many others with different mutations of CF don’t have that option. Other treatments have helped control Jen’s symptoms, but ultimately, a lung transplant was her only hope.
Jen and Laurel before Jen's first hospitalization at NYU in March 2024 Jen received her first transplant in 2015, but her body began to reject the donated lungs after five years, and she went back on the transplant list. All that could be done was wait for another set of lungs.
“You have that sweet spot, that window where you’ve got to be sick enough to get on the list, but then you have to be well enough and strong enough to survive an organ transplant surgery, so it’s a catch-22,” Laurel explains. “That’s why it’s so important that everybody is signed up to be organ donors.”
Laurel explains that she had long kept Jen’s medical journey private, but with mounting bills, she and Jen finally decided to share the story via the Children’s Organ Transplant Association (COTA). They hoped to raise both awareness and funds so that Jen could be close to her doctors at NYU before and after transplant surgery for a successful recovery. Little did they know that when Laurel shared out the updates, she was rebuilding a connection that would lead to a rare direct organ donation.
When Laurel and Jen moved to Philadelphia from their home in California for Jen’s first double lung transplant, Laurel reunited with several of her Epsilon Rho chapter sisters for the first time in decades. As Laurel shared the medical journey with sisters in person and online, she says the bond of Alpha Chi Omega was easy to pick back up. “They were so concerned and supportive,” she says of the Alpha Chi Omegas who reached out. “If it hadn’t been for Jen’s COTA fundraising campaign, the awareness of Jen’s declining health, the dire need for a transplant and being in a New York hospital near her doctors would never have happened.”
One of those Epsilon Rho sisters was Bridgit Riley, who had been following the COTA updates. In August, Bridgit’s son Luke received a message about the passing of one of his FBI colleagues. That family was looking to donate their loved one’s organs to a member of the FBI family – including the lungs. By a stroke of luck, Luke saw the message before he went off grid and shared it with his extended family to see if they knew someone in need of organ donation.
Bridgit immediately forwarded Laurel the message. “I was anxious,” Bridgit says. “I didn’t know if it was ‘false hope’ and not much about the transplant process but felt a sense of urgency.” When Laurel called back, she told Bridgit, “There is no such thing as false hope.”
That set a flurry of activity into motion – and quickly, as there is a very small window of time for organ donation. Looping in Jen’s medical team. Confirming that blood type and body size were a match. Reaching out to Jen’s step-uncle, a former FBI employee, to connect with the representative for the donor family.
Bridgit and Laurel circa 1983 So many things had to align – and they did. Just a day after Bridgit reached out, Jen and Laurel received the life-changing news: Jen was a match, and the family agreed to the donation. Jen was wheeled into an operating room in the late afternoon, and a helicopter delivered the lungs 3 hours later. And after a 10-hour surgery, the transplant was complete, and Jen’s body could begin the process of accepting the lungs and healing. As Laurel says of the whirlwind two days, “It was just meant to happen.”
Laurel kept Bridgit updated throughout the process. “This was an emotional roller coaster I was happy to be on,” Bridgit says. “I was excited and relieved for Jen, thankful that I was put in a position to help be a conduit with my son Luke in her transplant process, and also grateful to the family who were grieving their loss but made the decision to donate the organs, Jen’s uncle for his service and all the other people involved in her care.”
Laurel echoes that gratefulness, particularly for the family who donated the lungs. “To have someone who is going through such heart-wrenching times but wants to make sure that the organs go to somebody else so that they can get this gift of life – it’s amazing to have people like that.”
According to the U.S. government’s organ donor statistics, there are more than 103,000 people on the national transplant waiting list; another person is added every 8 minutes. Laurel points out that Jen’s “number” on the list may have not come up when she was healthy enough to receive a transplant – making this direct donation all the more powerful. Without these lungs and Bridgit’s message, Laurel says, “I’m sure Jen would still be waiting.”
Laurel and Jen have fundraised and advocated for organ donation, including being the faces of the 2016 Mother’s Day spring campaign with the Gift of Life Donor Program Foundation in Philadelphia, and plan to continue to do so after Jen recovers. Next steps for Jen are in-patient rehab, followed by outpatient treatment. “Jen still needs to raise funds to be near her transplant team for a successful recovery,” Laurel adds.
“Some people say to me, ‘I don’t know how you do it,’ and I say, ‘Because you have to.’ I never gave it another thought. There’s nothing more important to me in this world,” Laurel says. “Even though we’ve gone through this journey, I feel blessed. She’s my best friend, and I adore her. I would have, of course, preferred Jen to have a life without CF, but those were the cards we were dealt.”
Laurel is also grateful that she’s been able to reconnect with Bridgit and other Alpha Chi Omegas. “We’ve just been in our own little world, especially since COVID with Jen being immunosuppressed in rejection. We had been in isolation for the last four years … It’s just been nice, all the support and the well wishes and love that I’m feeling from all our friends all over the country.”
Bridgit has also been reminded of the power of the Alpha Chi Omega bond. She shares, “I would have done this for anyone if I had known their story or need, but the Alpha Chi Omega connection made this possible, and the ripple effect has strengthened even more bonds with a larger group of sisters looking out and supporting each other.” Bridget volunteers as a recruitment information advisor for the Theta Tau (Rutgers University) chapter and shared the story with some of the current collegiate members. “They are all pulling for Jen as part of the broader Alpha Chi Omega family. They can see the connection to Alpha Chi and the bond that continues beyond college.”
You can find out more about Jen’s story, organ donation and the family’s fundraiser on the Children’s Organ Transplant Association website at https://cota.org/cotaforjenslungs/