Living Kidney Donors

Philip

Age at interview: 30
Gender: Male
Outline: Philip, age 30, has a passion for kidney donation. At age 27, he was watching a television show about dialysis when he realized that he could help end someone’s suffering by donating one of his kidneys. Philip was already familiar with some of the struggles that patients with kidney failure face, given his experience as a nurse who cared for kidney donors and recipients. Following his procedure, Philip spent two days in the hospital recovering from the surgery before being released. Philip recovered from surgery quickly and was able to return to his hobbies (e.g., running, soccer) with no issues. His job allowed him to do tasks at his desk to help facilitate his recovery. Philip was happy he donated and would do it over again given the opportunity. In fact, since his donation, Philip has donated a portion of his liver to an anonymous recipient, after which he spent four days in the hospital and was able to return to his normal activities.
Background: Philip is a White man who lived in an urban area in the southwestern United States with his wife at the time of the interview. He and his family have since moved to the southeastern United States.
Time Since Donation: 3 years and 8 months

Type of Donation: Altruistic donation

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Philip gave his kidney altruistically, not knowing the identity of the recipient.

Philip gave his kidney altruistically, not knowing the identity of the recipient.

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…there's the directed kidney donation, which is to somebody that you know, whether it's family, friends, spouse, whoever it is. And that wasn't an option for me because I don't know anybody that needed a kidney…if you do the altruistic donation, you can choose to be anonymous, or you could choose to be in contact with the person that you donated…it didn't matter to me who is receiving my kidney. It was-it was someone who needed it. And that was more important to me than knowing who that person was…And one of the other things with the donation was that it created a chain of donations, which I thought was really cool. Uhm.. And so I think it ended up with my kidney going somewhere, and then that person's donor's kidney going somewhere and all over the country. And it-And at least one person in my state got a kidney as a result of this chain. And I thought that was really cool.

 

Philip encouraged others to donate their kidney.

Philip encouraged others to donate their kidney.

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If more people donated, then less people would be on dialysis, and we won't have- we wouldn’t be out there, you know, advertising that everyone needs to be donating, and we would be able to take care of a lot of chronic health issues. And so I think if you look at it from that standpoint, we should be doing nice things for each other anyways, but then it does-it does translate into bigger things, you know, politically and nationally in terms of healthcare, which is a big topic anyways. So that would be my-- my encouragement is start looking, and if you find out that it's not for you, that's okay. But at least you might have encouraged someone else to start looking as well, and it might be for them.

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