Whatever happened to: The guy who needed the liver transplant?

Last March, I wrote about Joel Beeson, a journalism professor in West Virginia who was all set to be the recipient of a new liver — via “living donor” transplant — when the Cleveland Clinic lowered the top age of donors to 55, and his donor was older than that.

“It is unlikely he will survive long enough to get a cadaver liver,” his wife told me. So they waited for a living person to donate a portion of their healthy liver. And waited.

Things got bad in September. He had a negative reaction to 68-80% of the general population pool, because of antigens he’d developed.

And then Rachel Fetty stepped forward.

He got a piece of her liver in October.

(Photo: Livr4Joel Facebook)

He was released from the hospital in November.

Unfortunately, I’ve so far been unable to get a medical update on Mr. Beeson.