I have been SO impressed with the number of people that reach out to me every week about kidney donation. People are so curious and are really looking to do something meaningful with their lives! I wanted to get a post on my site that addresses some common misconceptions as well as some of the magic that came out of this process for me.

Myths:

You are guaranteed to be a match to your family members, so you’re going to save your kidney in case someone in the fam needs one.

Just because you are related to someone doesn’t mean that you’re definitely a match. Being a match to someone requires that you have a compatible blood type, and you need to be a tissue match. I don’t have exact stats, but I have read multiple places that for siblings there’s a 25% chance of being an “exact match”…