There's absolutely no mother-in-law blues in this family when a man decides to be a living liver donor for his mother-in-law who could not find a matching cadaver donor. When other potential living donors were not compatible, the man especially after he discovered during a routine physical exam that his blood type was favorable determined that he was a compatible donor and wanted to donate. At first his family was skeptical because he is the father of three small children but he couldn't imagine his children without a grandmother. There is a donor organ shortage in the United States and in the world, and mother-in-law was not likely to get a donor offer through the standard system any time in the near future.
Because liver cells have the unique capacity to regenerate, a donor's organ returns to its normal size within four to six weeks, with no limitation of function. Still, because any surgery involves an element of risk, potential donors are carefully screened and educated. At Cedars-Sinai, the man was interviewed by a psychologist, a social worker, surgeons, and other transplant specialists.
More than 92,000 Americans currently await life-saving organ transplants, with 17 people dying each day due to the shortage of donated organs. Every year hundreds of thousands of people need donated tissue to prevent or cure blindness, heal burns or save limbs, and one out of three people will need donated blood in their lifetime, according to Donate Life America, the national organization for donation and transplantation. (Medical News Today)
