First-of-its-kind information & referral service for living kidney donors

May 15, 2013, 3:00am PDT UPDATED: May 15, 2013, 7:52am PDT
Effort seeks to boost kidney donations

Donate Life California, which manages the state-authorized deceased donor registry for organ and tissue donors, launched a first-of-its-kind information and referral service Tuesday for living kidney donors.

Kathy Robertson
Senior Staff Writer-
Sacramento Business Journal

Donate Life California, which manages the state-authorized deceased donor registry for organ and tissue donors, launched a first-of-its-kind information and referral service Tuesday for living kidney donors.
Living Donation California is a free service that provides information about living donation and refers potentially eligible individuals for evaluation at a transplant center.
Organ donation rates have increased in the last decade, but the need for kidney transplants — which comprise 80 percent of all transplant candidates — continues to grow.
California is doubly challenged. The state has 12 percent of the nation’s population, but nearly 20 percent of the national waiting list. Yet California has a low death rate, so the state provides just 10 percent of the nation’s potential donors.
People can live on one kidney if it is healthy and their overall health is good. Some medical conditions, like heart disease and diabetes, indicate the potential donor is not healthy enough to donate or would be at risk of kidney disease or other health issues now or in the future.
Senate Bill 1395, carried by former Sen. Elaine Alquist in 2010, authorizes California to establish a nonprofit altruistic living donor registry. A working group of representatives from 12 California kidney transplant programs and the state’s four organ procurement organizations designed the program rolled out this week.
Living Donation California is not a “registry” per se. Unlike Donate Life California, where enrollment documents are a legally binding commitment to donate upon death, Living Donation California will not commit a potential donor to a course of action. It serves as an information and referral source that discloses risks and benefits of living donation and offers a brief self-assessment to enable prospective donors to gauge their preliminary eligibility and self-select out of the process so transplant centers can focus resources on the most qualified candidates.
For more information, go to Living Donation's website http://livingdonationcalifornia.org/

http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/news/2013/05/15/effort-seeks-to-boost-kidney-donations.html