Lisa Sayer and her husband live on a small piece of paradise on Saltspring Island, the largest of the Gulf Islands scattered between the mainland and Vancouver Island. From the porch of their green bungalow is a stunning view of the Pacific Ocean, complete with lazy sailboats and a rocky beach strewn with shells. Ms. Sayer, 47, has spent the past decade raising her four children here, working as a veterinary assistant and indulging her husband's passion for fishing and the outdoors.
Earlier this year, that idyllic life took a remarkable turn.
A couple of years ago, she had come across a magazine article about someone who had donated a kidney to their partner. The piece included this alarming number: Nearly 60 people in Canada die each year waiting for a kidney.
Ms. Sayer, who lost her father to Parkinson's disease and two friends to cancer, hated the feeling of helplessness as she watched loved ones die.
She had always wanted to do something altruistic and dreamed of volunteering overseas. She had already donated blood and signed up to be a blood marrow donor.
This new thought seemed radical, yet it made perfect sense: She could give one of her healthy kidneys to a complete stranger.
Lisa Sayer on the job as a veterinary assistant. The kidney donor, who lost her father to Parkinson’s disease and two friends to cancer, hated the feeling of helplessness as she watched loved ones die.
“You take something out of someone and you put it into someone else,” says Ms. Sayer, a fit, tanned blonde with aquamarine eyes and a radiant smile. “I fell in love with that idea. It became very appealing.”
Ms. Sayer had no idea she would become the domino in a chain of events that would make Canadian medical history. In an extraordinary new program in the high-stakes world of kidney transplantation, her gift of life would end up helping not just one person, but four.
You take something out of someone and you put it into someone else. I fell in love with that idea. It became very appealing.— Lisa Sayer, non-directed altruistic donor
Living donors
Ms. Sayer is one of a growing, but still rarefied, group of Canadians who have chosen to become “non-directed altruistic donors.” They give one of their healthy kidneys to an anonymous stranger. In return, they ask for nothing, except that their travel and out-of-pocket expenses be covered. (It is against the law to buy or sell human body parts.)
In Canada, 35,000 people have kidney disease, and there is a chronic shortage of organs. Nearly 4,000 people are on the wait list for a kidney from a deceased person, a wait that can extend to a decade in Toronto and Vancouver, depending on the patient's blood type. It's no surprise, then, that live kidney donation is an attractive option, comprising 40 per cent of all transplants last year in Canada.
Most donors give a kidney to a family member or friend. However, in 2002, St. Paul's Hospital in Vancouver began a pilot program for non-directed altruistic donors. Since then, more than 40 people have been screened to determine whether they are physically and psychologically suitable, and five have gone on to donate.
Many wonder what motivates a person such as Ms. Sayer to give a kidney to someone she has never met. Are they searching for meaning through an act of selflessness? Are they prone to “projects,” with an overwhelming need to help others? Or are they just plain crazy?
Some kidney patients even feel queasy at the idea of taking somebody else's organ, doctors say. “There are patients out there who say they won't take a kidney from someone who is alive. They feel it could be bad karma,” says John Gill, a transplant nephrologist at St. Paul's.
Of course, he adds, the vast majority of patients just want to live.
