Kevin Way was just 32 when he suffered a motorcycle accident that would change his life for ever.

A trader for Lines Overseas Management (LOM), he was riding along South Shore in May, 1999 when he blacked out and crashed his bike into a wall, breaking his left leg in five places.

The 35-year-old, from Paget, knew no more until he awoke in the Intensive Care Unit at King Edward VII Memorial Hospital.

After several blood tests and examinations, doctors gave him the shattering news that he had been suffering from chronic kidney failure for about two months and had been totally oblivious to the fact.

From that day on, he had to undergo three-hour dialysis sessions three times a week in order to rid his body of fluid and toxins, which, if left, could have killed him.

There he began a painful journey of a two-month hospital stay, followed by months of dialysis and waiting on a kidney transplant list.

“I had been feeling terrible in the weeks leading up to the accident, but I thought it was the same flu that I seemed to get at that time of year, every year,” said Kevin.

“The last thing I ever suspected was kidney failure. There is a little bit of high blood pressure in my family, but nothing bad, and there is no history of diabetes. I had never even considered it before.

“After the accident, everything started to fit into place. I realised why I had been feeling so unwell. And people at work said it all started to fall into place for them, too.

“Apparently, I had been falling asleep at my desk from time to time and had known nothing about it.

“I think they just thought I had been out partying too much.”

As a result of the accident, Kevin has metal plates and pins in his leg, but, considering he could have been killed, it is a small price to pay.

Having lost both a brother and a sister in road accidents, he understood the reality of the accident all too well. However, the trauma of discovering the kidney failure added to his pain.

“I was in shock for a while. It was depressing, at first. I didn't know anything about acute kidney failure or the dialysis unit. It was a whole new experience. And then there was the foods and drinks that I could no longer have. It did change my life.”

Kevin was receiving dialysis for two years while he waited on a list for a kidney transplant. That in itself was sometimes a mental struggle because he knew that some people had to wait for as long as five years before a perfect match came up.

However, his life was soon to change. One of Kevin's six brothers and sisters, Margaret Mary, offered to donate one of her kidneys to him.

It was an almighty gift for a wife and mother-of-three, who also held down a full-time job in her home of Ohio in the US.

Two months after her offer, in March of last year, Margaret Mary and her brother underwent surgery at Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

It was a gift he said he would never forget.

Kevin said: “When Margaret Mary said she wanted to do it for me, I was a bit scared because I didn't want her to have any problems. But she was adamant.

“It took me a while to accept her help, but then I was just so grateful. It's harder for a body to have an organ removed than it is to have one added, so we both knew it was not going to be easy for her. They had to take out one of her ribs to get to her kidney, which is normal, and she was in a lot of pain, but after a while she was feeling much better. After two months she was back at work again.”

As for Kevin, after some initial rejection during the operation itself, and some internal bleeding in the days after, which was corrected with more surgery, he was soon on the road to recovery. Surgeons told him his kidney was so “messed up” they believed the failure had been caused by a virus.

As with all transplant patients, he had to remain in Boston for three months after the operation, but then was able to return to his home in Bermuda. Just a month later, he was back at LOM working part-time

He said: “I had not taken a pee for about 18 months while I was on dialysis.

“But just a few days after the operation, I was peeing up a storm. It was a great feeling.

“Now I'm back at the gym again, and playing tennis, and hoping to eventually get back to trading again. But the best thing for me was not having to have dialysis. I felt that I could have a normal life again. I am so grateful that I had a sister who was willing to go through that for me. I could well have been still having dialysis now. Not everyone is as fortunate as I was.

“This is why I would urge people to get information on organ donation and carry a donor card.

“No one is asking you to give a kidney to someone else while you are alive. You won't know anything about it.

“There are so many people out there on transplant lists. It could really make a difference.”