Odessa man hopes for kidney donation

Odessa American | Gabriella Lopez
Photo Credit: Albert Cesare

Landre Scott Stanford is waiting.

Minute by minute, day by day, the 39-year-old Odessa resident and others like him wait for an organ donation.

“A lot of people die waiting for a kidney,” Stanford said.

More than 95,000 people are registered for kidney donation in the United States as of Sept. 2, according to data from the Organ Procurement and Transplantation Network.

And as of February 2011 Stanford became one of them when he registered with the national list.

“It’s progressively getting worse,” Stanford said of his single damaged kidney.

While everyone is born with two kidneys and can live without one, Stanford said he was born with cysts on one and by the time the diseased kidney was removed it had already damaged the other.

Due to his polycystic kidney disease and end stage renal failure -- the almost complete failure of kidney function -- Stanford said he goes through dialysis three times a week for four hours each at the Desert Milagro Dialysis Center.

After being connected to a machine with two needles Stanford said his blood is removed and run through an artificial kidney, cleaning the blood.

Read more and learn how you may help: http://www.oaoa.com/articles/minute-72138-day-odessa.html

IF YOU BECOME A LIVING DONOR:

• How: Call the transplant hospital where the patient is waiting and contact the transplant coordinator to see if you are compatible blood types.
• More information on organ donation.