PIKE COUNTY, Ohio — At just 7 years old, Bobbie Shepherd got a second chance at life.

“The call came in September, and September 17, 1975, I was having a kidney transplant,” Shepherd said.

Now 57, Shepherd is celebrating 50 years with her donated kidney, making her one of the longest-living kidney recipients from a deceased donor in the nation.

“I’m just grateful, thankful and blessed, you know, to be this long out,” she said.

Shepherd said she owes her life to a family who lost a little girl in 1975 at Cincinnati Children's Hospital.

“She died of respiratory failure, and my mom had met the family, and the 16-year-old brother didn’t want her to be a donor,” Shepherd said. “And my mom said, ‘Would you please go in there and look at my daughter?’ He came back out, and he said, yeah, he

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