I'm giving my brother a kidney, but didn't expect for it to cost me thousands. How do I manage the expenses without going broke?

All this adds up fast and now Jade is looking at spending thousands of dollars to donate her kidney. And she’s not alone in this — a 2016 article in the American Journal of Transplantation found that 89% of living kidney donors had a net financial loss in the 12 months following donation, with 33% reporting a loss exceeding $2,500. While there aren’t many up-to-date studies on the matter, the American Society of Transplantation wrote in its Living Donor Toolkit that living donors may spend an average of $5,000 related to their donation in direct and indirect costs.

Offsetting the cost of kidney donation

While it might seem daunting, Jade does have some options that can help her offset the costs.

For starters, there are programs for living donors that provide financial assistance. Jade should talk to her and her brother’s surgery team to help explore the options available and make sure she has all the necessary information. Here are a few options that she might want to look into:

• The National Living Donor Assistance Center can cover up to $6,000 of travel costs, lost wages and dependent care costs if you donate at any transplant center.
• The National Kidney Registry’s (NKR) Donor Shield program offers up to $6,000 for travel and dependent care costs and up to $2,000 per week in lost wage reimbursement if you are involved in an NKR swap between certain transplant centers.
• The Meredith Haga Foundation has a Living Donor Financial Assistance Program that can help reimburse the costs of things like travel expenses, daycare and post donation support services. There is no application for this program, but your care team can refer you.

Of course, it can be hard to anticipate being a kidney donor, but one of the best ways to offset the costs of organ donation — or any other medical necessities and procedures — is by having an emergency fund. The typical advice is to have three to six months’ worth of living expenses in your emergency fund. In Jade’s case, having an emergency fund would mean she already has enough saved to help pay for her flights and childcare if she can’t get it covered by any financial assistance programs.

It is easier said than done to save an emergency fund, but the sooner you start — no matter how small — the sooner you’ll have extra cash that can save you during stressful times.

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