Abigail (Abby) Marsh

The person that was chosen to receive Harold's kidney was a woman who had no eligible donors in her own circle and other people had been tested and was dying of kidney disease.

It's an awful disease.

Living on dialysis is like a living death is how people describe it.

And Harold didn't know who she was when he decided to donate to her.

He went into surgery, had a kidney removed.

It was planted into his recipient.

Transplant surgeons describe it as a Lazarus effect.

When there are very few diseases like this that you can perform a surgery, the kidney starts working immediately.

It starts producing urine right away.

And the person is like brought back to life.

You know, that a plant that has been watered in a time lapse...

is how quickly they're restored to health and life and vigor.

And it was a tremendous success.

I'm sure it contributed to the fact that we now have programs like this on a wider scale.

And Harold and his recipients remain very good friends to this day.

Yes, that's one of the most important things to know about altruistic kidney donors is that although many people who themselves would not consider donating a kidney find the choice to donate a kidney to a stranger in need of explanation,

actual donors feel exactly the opposite.

They think if you have two kidneys and you could survive just fine with one, which is true, that if another person is going to die unless they get your kidney, the choice to donate to them is the obvious choice.

It feels to them so intuitive and so clear that they have trouble understanding why anybody wouldn't make that decision.

Yes, it was something I was really surprised to discover when I started working with altruistic kidney donors.