What makes a good donor? What if my living donor doesn’t have health insurance?

A good donor is someone who comes forward freely to donate his or her kidney. They must be in excellent health with two normally functioning kidneys. They are carefully evaluated by members of the transplant team (the nephrologist and surgeon have not evaluated the recipient). We want to try to uncover any potential problems that the donor may have in the foreseeable future that would jeopardize their remaining kidney. Two such examples are diabetes mellitus and hypertension, which are the primary and secondary causes of endstage renal disease in the United States.

Your insurance covers the cost of the donor’s care related to transplant. The sale of organs is illegal in the United States.