Generous man donates kidney to friend of 30 years

When Dave Mackenzie from Devon went into kidney failure, one of his closest friends offered to donate one of his own kidneys to help transform his life.

On Christmas Day 2015, Dave began having dialysis to help carry out the job of his damaged kidneys.

Unfortunately, his kidneys were in such bad shape that Dave was in need of a transplant.

It was at this point that is friend Paul Allen stepped up. The pair have known each other for other almost 30 years.

Dave was suffering because of his kidney disease, he said "just going upstairs, brushing your teeth, getting into bed...that would take one hour."

Paul saw his pain and decided that he wanted to donate one of his kidneys to his friend. After a number of tests, Paul proved to be a blood match to Dave.

He said that after finding out that he was a match his "first feeling was delight and relief that there was a solution for Dave."

Dave had a successful kidney transplant that changed his life. Paul says that the realisation of what he had done came when he received a card from Dave's wife Jane and their three children.

The children had written that "they had got their dad back." Paul encourages everyone to sign up to be an organ donor because "you can do such good things."