Saving lives and taxpayer dollars

Opinion-Home

CLOSE TO HOME: Saving lives and taxpayer dollars

By TISH LEVEE

Published: Thursday, April 2, 2009 at 3:00 a.m.
Last Modified: Wednesday, April 1, 2009 at 4:12 p.m.

A year ago this month, Dee Schilling, a Sebastopol attorney, donated a kidney to a friend’s husband through UC San Francisco, one of the leading kidney transplant centers in the world.

UCSF performs more than 400 kidney transplants a year, more than a third of them from living donors. Dee made a quick recovery and says donating a kidney “was no big deal.” Medically that’s true for nearly all living donors, but financially it can be a very big deal.

UCSF is the second-largest center for transplants from living kidney donors. A living kidney donation is the best possible treatment option for a person with end-stage kidney disease; it will keep working for an average of 18 years. The shortage of living donors means the average patient waits 7½ years for a kidney, usually on dialysis — an expensive and uncomfortable process.

In February, the National Kidney Foundation announced an exciting initiative called “End the Wait!” to eliminate the waiting period for a kidney by 2019. Increasing the number of living donors is an important aspect of this program. While donation is easier than ever medically, many potential donors do face a real financial sacrifice. The recipient’s medical insurance covers all of the donor’s medical expenses, but not their loss of income or out-of-pocket costs.

Dee was lucky. Her costs were just a few trips to San Francisco. As an attorney, she could schedule her own time and lost little income during her three-week recuperation.

As with Dee, I was lucky when I donated a kidney three years ago to Paul Lazovick, a New Jersey man I hadn’t met before. I recovered quickly, and at age 66, I was receiving Social Security, so I didn’t lose any income. But I had other costs, including three trips to New York and a two-week hotel stay. Fortunately, Paul was in a position to cover these costs, which he estimates exceeded $7,000.

Not all donors are as fortunate as we were. It can cost thousands of dollars to be a donor, which many people can’t afford in this economy. Many people agree there shouldn’t be a financial incentive for donating a kidney, but there shouldn’t be a financial sacrifice either.

That’s why Rep. Joe Wilson of South Carolina introduced the Living Organ Donor Tax Credit Act of 2009 — HR 218. It would give living donors a non-refundable tax credit up to $5,000 for lost wages and out-of-pocket costs.

Although this is a “cost-neutral” bill, it would ultimately save taxpayers millions, even billions of dollars.

Medicare spends approximately $106,000 on a kidney transplant and the first year’s follow-up care. After that, it only spends $17,000 annually per recipient for immunosuppressive drugs. Dialysis costs $71,000 annually per patient, so after two years Medicare begins saving $54,000 a year on each transplant.

Last year, 5,394 people chose to become living donors. Doubling that number could save almost $300 million a year in dialysis costs and nearly $4.7 billion over the life of the new kidney — not to mention saving more than 5,000 lives.

Chronic kidney disease is increasing. Twenty-six million Americans have chronic kidney disease and millions more are at risk. The demand for transplanted kidneys far outstrips the supply.

Over the last 10 years, the number of people waiting for a kidney has risen 86 percent, but the number of transplants has only grown 31 percent.

HR 218 helps to remove a significant obstacle to living donations. I urge you to ask your congressional representative to support and co-sponsor HR 218. Learn more about HR 218 at http://capwiz.com/kidney/issues/bills/?bill=12731371

Tish Levee, a Santa Rosa resident, is a free-lance writer and kidney donor.

http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20090402/OPINION/904019865/1065/NEWS06