A disc jockey who needs a new kidney spent the first day of 2005 with his family out of hospital.

DJ Paul Sofianos lost 55 pounds in a month and will be on dialysis for the rest of his life unless he finds a new kidney.

But he said yesterday he was already planning to use his DJ skills for fund-raising events to raise awareness about organ donation.

Both of Mr. Sofianos' kidney's failed on December 7, 2004 and he spent more than three weeks at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital.

"We want to raise money for the dialysis unit and create awareness for the need for organ donation," he said.

"I have already started fund raising ideas. I have spoken to some people for fund-raising events over the next two or three months."

And he said he was looking forward to actually playing at a few of the events as his health improved.

"Some people suggested a concert and other people thought we would do some fundraising in pubs and bars," he said.

"I'm feeling better," he said. "I am getting dialysis three times a week for three-and-a-half hours each time."

Although he said it was going well he guessed it took a while to build a tolerance to having a machine clean out his blood, rather than a natural organ.

"In the beginning I was very, very tired afterwards but now that happens less and less," he said. "It was an improvement".

An infection in his arm was nearly fully healed, he said, but a district nurse still needed to visit his home on a daily basis.

However, he said his massive kidney failure last month was just what he needed to turn his life around.

"At the end of the day this is the best wake up call I could have gotten. Since December 7, when I was admitted to to KEMH my blood pressure is lower, my cholesterol is lower. I lost 55 ponds. My diet has changed drastically," he said.

As a veteran smoker of 20 years he said it was not easy to quit.

But he said he has "not had a cigarette since December 5 and although I had lots of problems, that was the most difficult of them all. But I feel like I have kicked the habit now".

He wanted to thank his wife, family and employers for their invaluable assistance: "It has been mind-blowing what people have done for me... In this day and age you don't expect people to go as far as people have gone for something like this, you know what I mean?"