You could be the reason
someone stops waiting.
Most people who consider living donation never do it – not because they aren’t willing, but because nobody ever told them how it actually works. Here’s the whole thing, plainly.
What most people get wrong
You don’t need to find a hospital
This is the one that stops people. You don’t arrange anything, and you don’t need a transplant center of your own. You’re evaluated at the center already caring for the person you want to help. They handle it.
It typically doesn’t cost you money
Donor evaluation and surgery costs are generally covered by the recipient’s insurance, not by you. Programs like the National Living Donor Assistance Center can also help with travel, lodging, and lost wages. Ask the transplant team early – they do this every day.
Someone at the hospital works only for you
Every transplant center gives a donor an Independent Living Donor Advocate – a person whose only job is your interests, separate from the recipient’s team. You are not the afterthought in this process.
You can stop at any point
Any time, for any reason, right up until the day of surgery. You never have to explain why, and the transplant team will not tell the recipient your reason. Changing your mind is a normal outcome, not a failure.
Being incompatible doesn’t mean you can’t help
Even if you aren’t a compatible donor for the person you wanted to help, a paired exchange may still make it work – you donate to someone compatible, and they receive an organ from another donor. Transplant centers arrange this all the time.
Nobody can contact you first
Donor profiles are never shown publicly on this site. Recipients cannot browse donors and cannot message you first. You choose who to reach out to, and when. You will not be flooded with requests.
How it works here
Four steps. Nothing is decided until you decide it.
Read their stories
Browse the people looking for a donor. You don’t need an account to look, and the order is random every time – so everyone gets seen.
Reach out to someone
When someone’s story stays with you, create an account and send a message. That first conversation commits you to nothing at all.
Get evaluated
If you both want to go further, their page shows you the link to their hospital’s donor questionnaire – completing it is how the hospital process starts. From there the transplant center caring for them takes over: bloodwork, imaging, and a conversation with a mental health professional. They’re checking that donation is safe for you.
The hospital handles the rest
Every medical decision, from compatibility to surgery to recovery, belongs to the transplant team. We are not a medical provider, and we’re not part of that process.
What can be donated
Kidney
The most common living donation by far. Most people are born with two kidneys and can live a healthy life with one. Recovery is typically a few weeks. Long-term outcomes for donors are generally very good – and, as with any surgery, there are real risks the transplant team will go through with you in detail.
Liver
A living liver donor gives a portion of their liver, and over the following weeks and months both livers grow back toward normal size. Recovery is longer and more involved than for a kidney, and the risks are higher.
Lung
Rare. A donor gives one lobe, and two donors are usually needed for a single recipient. Unlike the liver, lung tissue does not regenerate – that capacity is given up permanently. Only a small number of centers perform it, and it deserves a long, honest conversation with a transplant team.
One of these people is going to meet the person who changes everything.
It could be you.