A hospice nurse who handed homemade cookies to her operating team. A retired stockbroker who had volunteered with the National Kidney Foundation and decided to walk the talk. And a woman inspired by President Barack Obama's call to volunteer. They all donated a kidney with nothing to gain - they didn't have a friend or loved one in the marathon chain of transplants that they helped make possible.
"It feels wonderful," Sylvia Glaser, 69, the hospice nurse, said Tuesday at a news conference where most of the donors and recipients met for the first time. "You are giving someone a life, and there is no substitute for that."
"It's not like I'm doing anything courageous," Bill Singleton, 62, the kidney foundation volunteer, told The Associated Press before his surgery. "If I don't volunteer, who will?"
From: "Patients meet donors from largest-ever kidney swap."
Sometimes you despair about the future of healthcare reform and healthcare delivery in general...
And then you read about something like the largest 'step' or 'stair' kidney transplant, done at Georgetown.
13 people giving of selves on a level you and I can't even begin to contemplate.
Tis the season people. Do something good with your resources, anatomical and otherwise.
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