Erie nurse donates part of her liver to a stranger. Why she did it

Family members wheeled Darlene Hargenrader into a UPMC Montefiore conference room in Pittsburgh to meet the woman who saved her life.

Allexa Morgan, a 25-year-old UPMC Hamot nurse from Erie, had donated nearly half of her liver to Hargenrader, even though she didn’t know her.

In fact, Hargenrader’s first thought upon seeing Morgan and her family in January was that Morgan’s mom was the donor.

“I just couldn’t believe that this young girl would do something like this,” said Hargenrader, a 64-year-old Venango County woman. “She knelt down next to me and we just cried and cried.”

Only certain organs can be donated by a living person. The kidney is the most common, followed by part of the liver, a lobe of the lung, and sections of the pancreas and intestine, according to organdonor.gov.

Living donor liver donations are rare, making up just 10% of all liver transplants, said Dr. Christopher Hughes, surgical director of the UPMC Liver Transplant Program. But what Morgan did was even more rare.

“UPMC is one of the leading centers for liver transplants and I’d say that just eight to 10 of these a year are altruistic donations from living donors,” Hughes said. “It’s not super common.”

Morgan has always wanted to help people. She became an emergency medical technician at 16 and a registered nurse at 20.

That same, strong desire also led her in July to donate half of her liver to a complete stranger.

“When I’m asked how could I donate part of my liver, I say how could I not do something that will change someone’s world,” Morgan said.

Morgan had never considered donating an organ until a fellow nurse at the UPMC Heart and Vascular Institute said that she had given part of her liver to a 2-year-old.

The two nurses had additional conversations and she eventually asked Morgan if she would ever donate an organ.

“At first, I said that it’s not for me,” Morgan said. “But I thought more about it and got used to the idea. I went home one day and called my mom. ‘You’re going to think I’m crazy but what if I donate part of my liver?'”

Morgan’s mother didn’t think she was crazy but supported her decision, so she started the process of becoming a liver donor.

She enrolled through a UPMC portal and then scheduled medical tests at Montefiore in May 2025. Morgan was told about possible complications from the surgery.

“The donor meets the entire team that day,” Hughes said. “We make sure they are healthy enough to donate and we talk about the risks.”

Morgan even met with a therapist to make sure she was mentally and emotionally prepared to donate.

UPMC called Morgan on June 4 and told her that she had passed all the tests and was accepted as a liver donor. They asked if she had any preferences about who would receive her liver.

“I said no, because how can you choose who gets a liver?” Morgan said. “Then I got a call just 10 days later.”

Morgan had matched with Hargenrader, who has battled non-alcoholic cirrhosis of the liver for decades as a result of the medication she takes to treat her multiple sclerosis.

Hargenrader was placed on the transplant list in 2022. No family members qualified as a donor.

Doctors told Hargenrader that she might not live to see Christmas without a transplant.

“My son put me up on flyers and on Facebook to try and find a donor,” Hargenrader said. “It got to the point that I couldn’t walk, couldn’t drive and I stayed in the house most of the time. I wasn’t around people much because I didn’t want to get sick.”

‘You might want to hear this. We have a liver donor’

Hargenrader was heading out for a rare trip with her family when UPMC called her in June. She almost didn’t take the call.

“I said it wasn’t a good time but my transplant coordinator said, ‘You might want to hear this. We have a liver donor.’ I started crying,” she said.

Surgery day was July 14 at Montefiore. Morgan and her mom arrived the day before and talked with the transplant team.

The last thing Morgan remembers was telling her mother that she loved her and that she will see her on the other side.

“The next thing I know, I’m waking up with no pain but a NG tube (in her nose) and I felt really tired,” Morgan said. “I asked if the recipient was OK.”

Hargenrader is ‘coming along’ after slow recvoery

In a separate recovery room, Hargenrader’s new liver was working well but her other health issues made for a slow recovery.

She remained in the hospital for 60 days and truly didn’t feel normal until March, Hargenrader said.

“I’m coming along,” Hargenrader said. “My memory is better and I’m driving my car in the park. I’m walking again. I use a walker inside the house but I have progressed to a cane outside.”

The two women finally met during their six-month checkups at Montefiore.

Morgan’s only complication is raised scar tissue along the incision site that runs vertically down her chest. It took less than three months for her liver to grow back to its original size.

Morgan is ready to help someone else

Hargenrader couldn’t wait to ask Morgan a question when they met.

“She asked me why did I do this?” Morgan said. “I told her that I wanted to help someone. I wanted to help her.”

Now Morgan wants to help someone else.

“I have already signed up to donate a kidney,” Morgan said. “I’m not allowed to do it until July, one year after my surgery.”