ST. LOUIS, March 10, 2005 - Kay Plozizka, 48, of Litchfield, Ill., was surprised to find that people thought she was doing something special. But to the Cline family, she''s a hero.

Plozizka, a dialysis nurse, donated a kidney to Joe Cline, one of her patients, on March 8 at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. Cline, 58, of Highland, Ill., had been on dialysis for 27 months. For 21 of those months, he dialyzed three times a week at DaVita Dialysis in Maryville, Ill. During most of those sessions, Plozizka was his nurse, connecting and disconnecting him from the machine that cleansed toxins from his blood, but sapped his energy.

Plozizka, a mother of two daughters, has been a nurse for 24 years, working as a dialysis nurse for the last five. While she enjoys the job and her interaction with patients, she became more and more aware of the toll kidney failure takes on patients and desperate need for organ donors.

The DaVita dialysis unit has almost 50 regular patients. Six of those patients, including Cline, were candidates for kidney transplants.

"I felt that I''m healthy and I''ve been given so much in my life," Plozizka said. "I see all these people who are so sick. I thought there''s no reason why I shouldn''t I donate a kidney to one of them. It would be my way to give back."

Of the six people at DaVita waiting for transplants, two had family members who were being evaluated as donors. One person was waiting for a second transplant, one''s blood type was different than Plozizka and another was not a good match for other medical reasons. That left Cline.

Despite his illness, Cline managed to work 40 hours a week at Basler Electric. But what really kept him going was spending time with his five-year-old grandson, Hunter. Cline told Plozizka his greatest hope was to get a kidney and be able to watch his grandson grow up. Plozizka says she felt that she was meant to offer her kidney to Cline.

After checking with management at DaVita, she told Cline she''d like to donate a kidney to him. Cline and his wife, Gigi, were stunned at first, then touched and grateful.

Plozizka began the rigorous screening for potential donors, having some medical tests performed in Litchfield, but driving to Barnes-Jewish on her days off for other tests and to meet with transplant coordinators. When finally given the go-ahead to donate, she and Cline scheduled the transplant.

Barnes-Jewish Hospital is one of the leading kidney transplant centers in the country, with one of the lowest rates of rejection. The center averages about 120-130 transplants per year, about 45 percent of those from living donors.

During the surgery, Cline and Plozizka were in adjacent operating rooms. Dr. Surendra Shenoy performed a minimally invasive kidney removal, called a mini-nephrectomy procedure, in which the donor kidney is removed through a tiny, three-inch incision. Dr. Martin Jendrisak, surgical director of kidney transplant, then implanted the kidney into Cline. Drs. Shenoy and Jendrisak invented the mini-nephrectomy procedure, which is less traumatic to the donor, and results in a faster recovery.

Plozizka''s kidney began working as soon as it was implanted. Gigi Cline said that she noticed as soon as she saw her husband after surgery in the observation unit that his color had already improved.

"I the moment I opened my eyes, I realized I felt better," he said.

Cline will take immune suppressing drugs for the rest of his life to prevent his body from rejecting the donor kidney. But barring complications, he will be able to return to an active life, according to Dr. Jendrisak. And studies show that living kidney donors have no health problems later in life from having donated, he said.

"To tell you the kind of person she is," Joe Cline said, "we were in the holding area right before we were about ready to go into the operating rooms. And the last thing she said to me was, ''I''m so proud to be able to do this for you.''"

"She is just a wonderful person," Gigi Cline said. "I put a ribbon around the flagpole at home. That''s in her honor."