Living Donor Advocacy

Jennifer Steel is an Independent Living Donor Advocate (ILDA) at the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center's Transplant Center. She is also on the executive committee of ILDAs for the National Kidney Foundation, and recently published the results of a national survey of ILDAs in the American Journal of Transplantation and completed a webinar for the Department of Health and Human Services concerning living donor advocacy.

The inadequate supply of organs in the United States and other countries continues to drive the reliance on living donor transplantation. In 2000, representatives of the transplant community convened for a meeting on living donation in an effort to provide guidelines to promote the welfare of living donors. The consensus statement that resulted from this meeting recommended that transplant centers retain an Independent Living Donor Advocate (ILDA) to focus on the best interest of the donor. A decade later, nearly every transplant center in the United States, performing living donor surgeries, has incorporated an ILDA into their living donor screening and/or evaluation process Living Donor Advocate provides an overview of living donation and its risks, ethical challenges and future developments , as well as details about the role a Living Donor Advocate plays in the transplantation process. This book will interest health professionals across various disciplines and patients undergoing transplantation or living donor surgery.

A comprehensive overview of live organ donations and its risks, challenges and future directions

Part I: Living Donation: Chapter 1: The Medical Selection of Live Donors,- Chapter 2: Kidney Paired Donation Programs for Incompatible Living Kidney Donors and Recipients.- Chapter 3: Living Donor Liver Transplantation.- Chapter 4: Intestinal Transplantation from Living Donors.- Chapter 5: Living Donor Lung Transplantation.- Chapter 6: Live Donor Pancreas Transplantation.- Part II: Living Donor Advocacy: Chapter 7: The History of Living Donor Advocacy in Living Donor Transplantation.- Chapter 8: Findings from a National Survey of Living Donor Advocates.- Chapter 9: The Independent Donor Advocate and the Independent Donor Advocate Team.- Chapter 10: Clasification of Living Organ Donors.- Chapter 11: Unrelated Donors.- Chapter 12: Education of the Donor by the ILDA (Psychosocial Aspects).- Chapter 13: Components and Timing of the ILDA Evaluation.- Chapter 14: Contraindications to Living Donation from an ILDA Perspective.- Chapter 15: Management of Conflict Between the Independent Living Donor Advocate and the Transplant Team.- Chapter 16: Story Behind the Story.- Chapter 17: Living Donor Experience.- Part III: Living Donor Ethics: Chapter 18: Informed Consent for Living Organ Donation.- Chapter 19: Pressure and Coercion.- Chapter 20: Financial Considerations.- Chapter 21: Autonomy, Agency, and Responsibility: Ethical Concerns for Living Donor Advocates.- Chapter 22: A Practical Guide: Role of the Independent Living Donor Advocate: Protect or Advocate or Is It Both/And?.- Chapter 23: Racial Disparities in Kidney Transplant and Living Donation.- Chapter 24: The Evolution of the Role of the Independent Living Donor Advocates: Recommendations for Practice Guidelines.