CHARLOTTESVILLE, VA (CVILLE RIGHT NOW) – Currently, more than 100,000 people are on the waitlist to receive a kidney, but only some 6,500 living donation transplants take place each year. That’s why Christopher Rucker is talking about his own experience.

Donating a kidney had been in the back of his mind, but it came to the fore when he learned of a friend whose son was in need. That’s when he approached his friend, Dr. Shawn Pelletier, chief of UVA Health’s Division of Transplant Surgery.

“He told me it’s fairly safe, and the one thing he said was, ‘I’ve never met anybody who has regretted doing it.’ And the risk of kidney problems with one kidney versus two is very minuscule. So that’s all I needed to hear. I jumped in,” he said.

“A kidney transplant can help someone live two or three times longer than being on dialysis alone, as well as giving them a better quality of life,” Pelletier said. “So, someone like Chris who comes forward to donate a kidney is giving a future life to somebody.”

Organ donation doesn’t happen overnight. Tests, screenings and other steps must be taken, but the need is there. And kidneys are not the only available living organ donations. Living donors can also donate sections of lung, liver, pancreas and intestine.

More information on living organ donation can be found here.