An 83-year-old man has become the oldest living kidney donor in the UK and the oldest person in the country to give a kidney to a stranger.
Nicholas Crace is the latest member of an exclusive club known as altruistic donors - someone who gives a kidney to somebody on the NHS waiting list whom they do not know.
The former charity director, from Overton, Hampshire, said: "I knew that 7,000 people are waiting for a kidney and that one person dies almost every day while waiting.
"I couldn't have lived with myself with the knowledge that I had had the chance of changing someone's life and turned it down."
The operation, which took three hours, was carried out recently at the Queen Alexandra Hospital, Portsmouth.
Tests at the hospital revealed that the widower's kidneys functioned as well as those of someone in their 40s.
Crace said: "The surgeon congratulated me on the perfection of my kidneys.
"In fact, given a halter, he would gladly have led me into the winner's enclosure at the Smithfield Show to have a rosette pinned on."
Annabel Ferriman, chairwoman of Give a Kidney - One's Enough, a charity dedicated to raising awareness of altruistic donation, said: "Altruistic donors are very special people.
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