Donor Diaries
Donor Diaries is a podcast that delves into the beauty and complexity of living organ donation. Tune in to hear extraordinary stories of people who choose to share their organs and give the gift of life. The world of kidney and organ donation is a powerful testament to kindness, love, and the human spirit.
With over 90,000 individuals on the kidney transplant waitlist and about 13 people dying each day while waiting, the urgency is real. One in three Americans is at risk for chronic kidney disease, and one in nine already suffers from it, often unknowingly.
Donor Diaries offers unfiltered narratives from living donors and candid insights from transplant experts, aiming to elevate the conversation around organ donation. Our goal is to bring this crucial issue to the forefront, so no patient has to wait in vain or suffer needlessly.
Donor Diaries
Latest Episodes
DOVE: Changing How Veterans Find Kidney Donors | EP 40
Being told you need a kidney transplant is overwhelming. Being told you need to go find your own living donor while managing dialysis can feel impossible. For many veterans, that is exactly how the system works today.In this episode, we ...
The Transplant Games of America: Where Donation Comes Alive | EP 39
You can’t fully understand organ donation until you see what it makes possible. Parents reaching milestones they once thought they might miss. Grandparents meeting grandchildren. Families holding both grief and pride at the same time. ...
Workplace Support That Changes Everything | 38
What if a simple HR policy could help save someone’s life? In this episode, Brooke Iarkowski, Transplant Community Program Manager at the American Society of Transplantation, shares how paid leave transforms the living donor journey from a fina...
From One Kidney To Many | EP 37
One kidney can change many lives—if we let it start a chain. We sit down with Dr. John Friedewald, transplant nephrologist at Northwestern Medicine, to unpack a breakthrough: using a deceased donor kidney to initiate a living donor chain that m...
Choosing Life: Renal Warriors Wilson & Amy | EP 36
In this episode of Donor Diaries, we sit down with transplant recipient Wilson Du and living kidney donor Amy McCann, two people whose stories intertwine through determination, community, and the belief that choosing life is a daily practice.
