Monday, July 29, 2002 | 10:57 a.m.
To watch Las Vegas resident Barbara Knight and Dr. Nicholas Feduska together is to be reminded of two long-lost friends reunited.
But it was a far different chain of events that brought the doctor and the 58-year-old mother of six together: Knight suffers from kidney failure, a condition that can be deadly if the afflicted does not receive a kidney transplant.
Fortunately, Feduska performed the life-saving surgery July 23 and it was a success, he said.
Ordinarily, the story would end here. In Knight's case, however, it's just the beginning -- this was not the first time Feduska saved Knight's life with a kidney transplant.
Knight first met Feduska in 1977, when the surgeon was practicing at the University of California, San Francisco Medical Center. The hospital, considered one of the best for such surgery in the country, was the closest center to perform kidney transplants. The Sunrise Renal Transplant Center at Sunrise Hospital in Las Vegas would not open for another 12 years.
In 2000, unbeknown to Knight, Feduska was drawn to Sunrise for the opportunity to be part of the growing program.
The rest, as Knight said, "was meant to be."
When Knight recently began to suffer kidney failure again, she began researching doctors in the area before a friend recommended a transplant specialist who had just started practicing at Sunrise.
Knight knew it was Feduska when her friend mispronounced his name.
"I thought, 'Boy, that name sounds awful familiar,' " Knight said.
Sure enough, when Knight went in for a consultation with Feduska, she came face-to-face with the same doctor who performed her first kidney transplant 25 years ago in San Francisco.
It was a new experience for Feduska, who has performed more than 2,000 transplant surgeries -- but never two on the same patient.
"I've never had the privilege to operate on someone a second time," said Feduska, who called the experience "humbling and thought-provoking."
For Knight's family, having Feduska operate a second time was more than a fortunate coincidence. Asked to describe his feelings, Knight's husband Martin spoke softly.
"I don't know what to say," he said. "I've been very blessed. Maybe it was meant to be."
He said that in the 25 years between the two surgeries, the family was too busy to slow down.
"Maybe I just assumed everything would be fine," he said. "We had six kids to raise."
Shellee Riggio, the couple's daughter, came from Lake Geneva, Wis., to be with her mother during the operation, her 18th major surgery.
For Riggio, her mother is a role model, teaching her about fortitude in the face of adversity, she said. She recalled her mother walking to her dialysis appointments just so she could maintain an exercise regimen.
"She's a living, walking precious miracle," Riggio said. "Her will to live is amazing."
Riggio makes a point of showing off the donor sticker on her Wisconsin driver's license, urging people to "share their life."
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