By Chris Davis | KOTA Territory News
Almost 60 percent of adults in the state are on the organ, tissue, and eye registry.
But Alayna Sathre's experience with donation goes well beyond checking a box on a form.
She's been on both sides of organ donation, starting back in 2003.
"When I was 18," Sathre said, "I lived in England, and I was injured in a bar. Someone threw a pint glass at my head."
In addition to reconstructive surgery, doctors told her she would need a cornea transplant.
"When I was told that I would be blind in the eye I was injured in, it felt kind of, like, as dramatic as this sounds," she said, "it kind of feels like life is ending in a way."
A few months later, Sathre got her new cornea.
And that's what turned her on to organ donation.
"At that point, I thought, 'How cool would it be to do something for other people?'"
So she started doing some research.
Sathre found a Web site to advertise her organs. It's called matchingdonors.com, and, like the name suggests, it matches up organ donors with recipients all over the country.
After searching through thousands of profiles, she found a man in Arizona she wanted to help.
"One day I just called him out of the blue," Sathre said.
She told him she wanted to give him a kidney.
He was blown away.
"I don't think he could really muster the words," she said. "And what's, like, a bigger word than 'thank you?'"
The two were a perfect match, and a few months later, the transplant was performed in Phoenix.
"I don't regret it at all," Sathre said. "This guy that I gave my kidney to is now so happy and so much healthier."
She added that "even if there was a drawback, you don't even think about that. You think about the bigger picture."
And to her, the bigger picture is saving lives.
Sathre still keeps in touch with the man she gave her kidney to.
She said he's doing so much better now that his doctors have been able to reduce his medication to almost nothing.
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