Group advocates support for organ donors

On May 19, 2023

The Clarion Call Care Group and the Nisa Medical Group, have called for more care and support for organ donors across the country. The group made the appeal at the 2023 Inaugural Living Donor Day Celebration, organised to honor selfless individuals, who had donated an organ, in Abuja.

Dr Ibrahim Wada, Founder, Nisa Medical Group, said the event which is the first of its kind in Nigeria, was organised to connect and honour individuals who had given the gift of life to others.

“I say to them, your courage, compassion, generosity have touched the lives of countless individuals and families and for that we thank you. Through this event, we aim to not only recognize but also offer our support to living kidney donors who have often undergone challenges in their journey to give life to someone else. We want to provide a platform for living donors to share their experiences, to connect with others who are on similar journeys and to receive the support and care that they rightfully deserve,” he said.

The first Kidney Donor in the South-East, Mr Joseph Uma said that inadequate awareness had remained a setback to the donation of organs, especially kidney to those in need.

“Let me use this opportunity to tell everyone to take me as an example, I had those fears but I tried to encourage myself and push the fears aside. So I encourage everyone to donate because it can happen to anyone close to you, your wife, child or relation. Though, you will have some discomfort at the beginning but after a while it will fizzle out, there is no need to entertain fear,” he added.

Ms Mary Brown, a nurse from United States reiterated the importance of the gesture. She also noted that the event was aimed at appreciating persons who had donated one of their organs to saving the life of others. She said it was important for Nigerians not to be scared of donating, as it is fulfilling in seeing someone coming back to life because of such gesture.

“For us in the U.S. we celebrate an entire month for all the living donors in the month of April, because you can give more than just a kidney. And we are here to celebrate all the 13 transplants we have done here. And we want to give a special thanks to the donors that allowed those other patients to get off dialysis and have a better quality of life and a long quantity of life as well. So for us, it is important for us to let the donors know that we care about them, their health. We want to be a resource for them so that we can take care of them if anything happens,” she said.

However, the highlight of the event was the launch of a book titled “Priceless’’ authored by Mr Joseph Uma, the first living donor from South-East Nigeria.

Wumi/NAN