Ben Konkin is dying.
As a rare condition called scleroderma hardens tissue throughout his body and compromises his lungs, Ben’s overworked heart begins to fail.
He’s admitted to Vancouver General Hospital, where a nurse reviews his vitals in a private room. Soon after, Ben learns that he’s been approved for a double-lung transplant, ending a nearly two-year waiting period and providing hope for a fighting chance to live.
This is one of the heart-wrenching tales that unfold in Transplant Stories, a new documentary series with intimate access into the challenges faced by organ recipients inside the operating room and in their daily lives.
The four-part series, premiering on the Knowledge Network Nov. 19, is produced, directed and co-written by North Vancouver filmmaker Sheona McDonald.
When she was first approached to make the show, McDonald was drawn in by the prospect of spotlighting the marvel of transplant medicine.
“It’s amazing what we can do,” she said. “All of the patients in this series, except for the cornea transplant patient, would have died at any other time [in history].”
Every potential organ recipient is always walking a fine line.
“You have to be sick enough to be transplanted, but not too sick,” McDonald said. “But without medical intervention, [they] wouldn’t have a chance.”
Even if a transplant is successful, the high-wire act continues.
“The organs wear out more quickly, so you don’t know how long you have,” she said. “There’s constant testing once you’ve had a transplant.
“But also the drugs are really intense,” McDonald added.
Interwoven into the same 50-minute episode that features Ben is the story of Addison McArthur, who became the first pediatric heart transplant recipient at BC Children’s Hospital, 13 years ago.
“Addison’s kidneys are compromised because of the drug program that she’s on,” McDonald said. “What’s amazing to me in that story is the heart that got transplanted into her was probably the size of a walnut, and it’s been in her body most of her life, and yet still her body would reject it immediately and attack it were she to go off the anti-rejection drugs.”
Medical experts are hopeful for a future where donated organs can be recognized by the recipient’s body, she said. “And I think that’s fascinating.”
But not every story on the show has as hopeful an outcome.
Powerful operating room footage pulls back veil on typically unseen event
In Ben’s case, you witness his tears of joy when he receives the news that his doctors have a pair of lungs for him. They tell him the procedure is still fraught with risk.
“I know the risk,” Ben replies. “I know what I have ahead of me without the transplant, and I will fight every inch for this.”
With only a small window of opportunity, he quickly goes into surgery.
Inside the operating room, cameras train on Ben – only small parts of his body are exposed amid a sea of blue blankets and scrub-wearing physicians.
What comes next is not for the squeamish, as the surgeons work to remove Ben’s near-useless lungs to replace them with a working pair.
Out of a specialized cooler comes the new set of lungs, which look to be around the size of a Thanksgiving turkey.
“When those lungs come out, they’re huge,” McDonald said. “Like, did you know your lungs were that big? It’s kind of amazing that it’s a part of someone else’s body that we can put into another person.
It’s powerful footage that pulls back the veil on a normally unseen event.
“How often are people in an emergency or in an operating room in their lives to see that sort of thing?” she said.
McDonald said she felt incredibly privileged to have that kind of access to the patients’ experiences. That critical piece of the show came through BC Transplant, which let patients in their system know that the producers were looking for willing participants.
Ben hoped his story would help others
Ben’s dad Dann Konkin said his son was really excited to be on the show.
“He said, ‘You know, Dad, I’m not sure what’s going to happen, but if I can help someone else through what I’m going through, I really want to do this,’” Dann recalled.
Though continuing to fight post-surgery, Ben’s kidneys began to fail and his other organs shut down. Then, after 20 weeks in intensive care, Ben died on Nov. 23, 2023, with his family by his bedside. He was 42 years old.
Throughout the episode, Ben’s enthusiastic demeanour and sharpness of mind cut through the intensity of all that’s happening around him.
“He kept people engaged,” Dann said. “[The show] is the great swan song for him. Obviously that was not the outcome that he or any of us wanted, but if it wasn’t going to work out, he wanted to be that person who helps someone else.”
One of Dann’s favourite scenes in the episode shows Ben’s wife Julia flipping through photos and videos of him before he became sick
“I was thrilled they did that scene, because people watching the show for the first time, not knowing Ben, have no idea the man he was,” Dann said. “He was full of life. He was energetic, he was healthy, he was fun to be with, he loved people. He was the guy.”
Before moving with his wife to Kelowna in 2017, Ben spent the first 35 years of his life in North Vancouver. A Carson Graham grad, he grew up a talented athlete playing and coaching soccer, and several other sports. Later, he became obsessed with cars.
Looking at those images of Ben before he got sick shows people the person he was.
“He had a presence. And then when you see him as sick as he was, they can certainly tell that, wow, this disease really is a terrible disease that took a lot of his physical stature away,” Dann said.
Transplant Stories has important lessons to share, he said.
“Life is precious,” Dann said. “You never know what’s around the corner, and you never know what someone might be faced with.”
“I’m really looking forward to seeing all the episodes,” he said.
