Katie's Story: Advocating for herself — and her people
AKF Ambassador Katie Hallum has been forever changed by her experience with kidney disease.
Katie developed IgA nephropathy (IgAN), a rare form of the disease, at age 18. It wasn't long before she required dialysis and a life-saving kidney transplant.
She came by her new kidney in a most unusual way: Making a TikTok video using the "You have something I want" line from "The Mandalorian."
Katie's humorous post caught the eye of then-22-year-old nursing student Savannah Stallbaumer. Savannah wondered if she could help this complete stranger by becoming a living donor. They were a match, and the kidney transplant surgery was performed in August 2023.
Today, 23-year-old Katie is living an ambitious life only made possible by her kidney transplant. She graduated from the University of Oklahoma (OU) in May 2024 and relishes her job as an Indigenous Affairs Reporter for the NPR affiliate in Oklahoma City. (Katie is part Cherokee and Quapaw.) She volunteers at OU Children's Hospital and touches base with Savannah weekly. "She's my sister at this point," Katie said of her living donor.
In fall 2025, Katie will head to the OU College of Law. She plans to use her law degree to fight for health care access for Native Americans, who have exceptionally high rates of diabetes and end-stage renal disease.
Katie has shared her remarkable story at several AKF events and in a video for AKF's Know Your Cause webpage, and most recently was the recipient of a Carolyn Wilson Dialysis Patient Scholarship, which provides support for people with kidney failure living in Arkansas, Louisiana and Oklahoma to further their education or vocational training as part of an effort to initiate, maintain or resume employment and independent living.
"[Being an AKF Ambassador] means being an advocate for my people. It means being an advocate for the kidney community. It means being an advocate for health equity for all."