UW Health has launched a new program to educate the public about living organ donations.
The Living Donor Initiative aims to increase the number of living kidney and liver donors at the UW Health Transplant Center, which served approximately 100 living liver and kidney donors last year.
The goal is to increase this number by 20% over two years, according to Dr. Dixon Kaufman, the Director of the UW Health Transplant Center.
The Living Donor Initiative will expand community outreach and education efforts to increase awareness and understanding of living donation by developing educational materials and traveling to health departments, wellness fairs, and other community events around Wisconsin and northern Illinois.
There are more than 90,000 people nationwide on the waiting list for a kidney transplant.
Those patients can spend years on dialysis until they have a match, and 11 people die each day waiting for a kidney.
To learn more about living donation, visit uwhealth.org/living-donor.
